Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

ive had my system running since late may / juneish and id say its still not settled down. infact plant growth has only been you beaut in the last 3 or 4 weeks.
as everyone say, patience patience patience
btw good to hear the plants are coming good

If you're sure the plumbing is working and you have no pest issues just ignore it for a while, that should get everything working hunky dory

Hillsy,
I started using Hydrochloric acid to get the PH under control. Started at around PH of 8.6 10ml of HCl and down to PH 8. Next day right back up to 8.8. I will keep going to see if I can keep it down over the next week. I am starting to think it may be the pea gravel.

Rob

mine was doin the same for a while, I don't know how old yours is but I just let mine be, It has cycled itself now and ph is down, now I have to start buffering it up, I am using hydroton but like everyone has said, ph will be high when it's cycling.seems to have levelled out now. How old is your system.

This is the second time around. All the fish died in august. I ended up taking all Pea gravel out and washing it. There was about 50+mm of clay stuck in the bottom of GB. This time around. I am only about 3 weeks into it. I am prepared to give it another couple of months to come down. But if still high by December the pea gravel will have to go.

my system is mostly peagravel, and it sits on a PH of 6

Been a while since the last update so thought it was about time. Everything is going along fairly well.

Harvested my first lettuce a couple of weeks ago now which was exciting. Been picking bits and pieces since. Have a few lettuce ready to go, been getting the odd been of decent size, so get a little treat every couple of days while I'm playing around out there. Truss tomatoes are going well, chives have finally started to take off and the basil and parsley are going really well also. Have few seedlings popping up around the place. Had a few disasters and the strawberries aren't going too well but all in all I'm pretty happy so far.

Fish are going good and have put on a little size. Tried to bring the PH down with HCL with no success. Tested the water for the first time in weeks today and still up around 8 but everything else has zeroed out so going to continue to leave it be. Water has cleared up well can see the fish at the bottom of the tank now. Not sure if it was the swirl filter I made or the reconfiguration of the SLO to the middle of the tank but its looking pretty good at the moment.

More pics

Looking much better there M8, Will have to catch up, I wanna check out that swirl filter, I'm curious now! lol

That pH will come down as the system matures Hillsy - feels like it takes forever, but it will do it eventually.

You may just wanna throw in a little chelated iron as the iron gets locked out of availability when the pH is up around 8.

Harvested my first capsicum tonight and a couple of carrots. Apart from the tomatoes which are coming quite frequently now its been my only real harvest of late. PH is still high so everything else has been slow. Basil bolted straight to seed and last couple of lettuce did likewise. Fish are going well. Still have a few yabbies left in the sump, they have culled themselves down from the 10 originals.

So time to see what the new year brings to my system. If I cant get the PH down I might have to change out my media and possibly move it all and expand in another location. Possible build a green house on the other side of the yard. Have another bathtub ready to go but will just wait and see how things pan out.

Hillsy,
I ended up cutting my pea gravel way down and topping it up with Hydroton. Seems to be making all the difference in the PH.

I'm the same as you Hillsy, other that caps chillis and tommies no real harvest, and I have peagravel but my ph stays at about 6.4, I have to use limestone to buffer it. I think it's the heat and the time of year stopping lettuces growing

G'day hillsy
Good to see the harvest starting to happen
that pea gravel from that shop seems to make it hard to get things set without playing around all the time
we had to give a bucket of toms away on sat just to many to eat and i hate wasting them

cheers Wolly

Well looks like I'm going to have a busy start to 2011.

Managed to scavenge a heap of 40mm chain link fence poles. The building site I am on ripped out an old chain link fence, moved it and replaced it with a new one. The old fence poles went in the scrap bin until I sorted through the bent ones and saved the straight ones. Black, bit scratched and faded but nothing a coat of paint cant fix or not even bother. Got enough to build a decent green house and add a chook pen on the end of it. 6x3 greenhouse 3x3 chook pen, 2.5 - 2.4 high. Just need the brackets to hold it all together, the greenhouse film and a bit of chook mesh. So looks like I will be moving my system across the other side of the yard, sounds like fun

Not bad must have been meant to be, right place at the right time. Well that's how it started out anyway. The bastards came off the roof racks just around the corner from home and went through the windscreen of my work van.

Drive for 40 mins without a problem about to turn into the last major corner and some idiot cuts in front of you, makes you tap the brakes a little bit harder and crash, bang and smash. Lucky I was only going slow or could have been a lot worse.