Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Lovely work on the decking.
Out of interest, how are you checking for salt percentages?

Yeah it was really difficult. I don't think I will ever try to do a curve again.



This one has the mark. The ones that don't have the mark are a different species often called false black widows. I forgot to put air holes in the lid of the bottle I caught it in. It's now dead, but you can still see the mark.

Last night I was throwing some wood in the fireplace when a widow came running out. Not taking any chances with that one so I hit it with my blow torch.

Our version, the Redback spider, we get around here tend to have varied markings and some even have none although I don't check their bellies. I don't trust any of them. The buggers are everywhere. If they're in the way then they get the boot! Wonder if fish eat 'em?

Decided to fix a couple flaws in my design. The solids lifting overflow pipe was undersized. Whenever more than two beds drained at the same time I would get flooding. So I decided to upgrade from 2" pipe to 4" pipe.

Another thing I noticed was pond 2 would build up a lot of solids. I really don't understand why. They come in from the top and should leave out the bottom though the SLO. Pond 2 is not currently stocked with fish so all the solids must be coming from Pond 1 and not moving on to the sump quick enough. So the only thing I could think of why the solids would build up there is the GBs are not dumping directly into Pond 2 and it is not getting the same kind of water flow/action as Pond 1. Well my fix for that is to reroute Pond 1 directly into Pond 3 (sump) and then when I get my new GBs online I will have them dump into Pond 2.

Might have to wait a little while to get the new GBs online. My friend who can get the IBCs free is owed money from the plant owner who has the IBCs. So he doesn't want ask for anything until he is paid. So in the mean time I am pumping water from the Pond 3 back to Pond 2 in a loop.



Had to pump out a lot of water to make the changes.



My water is mostly clear with a hint of greenish/brown color.

Pumped the water back in. Tested the pipe for leaks. Hard to tell because it had been raining the whole time I was doing this project.



Ended up with more water than when I started.



No leaks. Backfilled and compacted trenches. No more flooding when all 4 beds dump.

Just want to edit this previous post. Salt .18% and .17% which is 1.8 and 1.7 ppt respectively.

1.7% salt is 50% sea water.

With the Pond Care salt level test kit from API. The bottom link says it's discontinued due to mercury content. I shall have to be careful when handling.

Actually looks like most suppliers have discontinued it.

http://www.cacoosingcreek.net/servlet/Detail?no=318

http://www.pondsplantsandmore.com/Produ ... single=YES

Tested water today. It's been raining and I wanted to see how that would affect the system.

PH: 6.4
Ammonia: trace
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 20

Not much change really. My nitrates had almost completely disappeared in september. Everything was growing really fast too. Now growth has slowed (I assume because of light and temp) and nitrates are on the rise.

Buy a salinity refractometer... they cheap, but accurate... and read directly in ppt...

P.S ... sea water is 32 ppt....

So I moved all my fish from pond #1 into pond #2 and pond #3 in preparation for receiving 100 trout. I have an appointment to pick them up Monday morning. There were about 30 goldfish/koi in pond #3 and 50 in pond #2...

This morning I checked the ponds and pond #3 was empty with a bunch of bird feathers floating on top. I checked the SLO pipe and found about 9 hiding inside the pipe. Atleast it's not a total wipe.

Inspired by Hydrophilia's pics with two catfish in some pipes, I decided to lay some extra 3" pipe I have laying around on the bottom of the ponds. Fish houses!

Keep any 4" or 3" pvc scraps you get! If you don't want 'em, my catfish would love 'em! I just don't want to buy a stick of the stuff.

Hehe, you should see the side of my house... Having worked as a plumber and landscaper for a long time, I got pipe out the butt.

Time for an update.

Harvested some celery. I don't know how to tell if it is self blanching, so I put a short piece of pipe over it two weeks before harvest. It grew rather tall. Later I harvested some without blanching and it tasted fine, just a bit extra salty. Not a problem if since we cook with it.

I still have more growing. I have been selectively harvesting it since. Last time I just trimmed off the stalks around the sides. I guess that wouldn't work if it wasnt self blanching.

I found this gal in a piece of firewood. I managed to get a picture of her belly for proof of her nature.





I harvested my friend's tobacco plant addition to my grow bed. Smells really nice. So for future reference, tobacco grows really well in AP.

The pump I am currently using is the type with a prefilter. When I first started the system the filter would get clogged up, flow would diminish, and the filter would need cleaned (I usually just washed it into the GB).

Recently I had been letting the pump maintenance get away from me, but I noticed the flow hadn't diminished at all. So I opened it up to find out why.







As you can see I have worms cleaning the filter. It has been 2 months since I cleaned it and still no flow diminishing or other problems. The filter looks pretty clean every time I open it up. It may untrue that a pre filter pump won't work well for AP. Perhaps those who tried the pre filter pumps before were too obsessive about cleaning the filter every week and never allowed the worms to get a foothold.

I'm not advocating we all switch to pre filter pumps. I'm just saying....