Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I love how neat it all looks, I am stealing your idea of the cling film on the spring onion/ chive idea.....awesome, more clay to grow in

Had a quick update of your Thread..

You said you Added CAT Poo to the Duckweed...

Sorry I would not do that.. Cats have a few Bugs that live and are passed via their Poo..
IT is not health for Humans..

They say that you should stop the cat's from doing their Business in your vegetable gardens, so I can't see where it is health to add Cat Poo to the Duckweed that shall be feed to the Fish...

sorry the only spot you should put Cat Poo is in the Rubish bin..

Try using other forms of Poo/scat, Like Sheep/Cow/Horse if you want the organics for the Duckweed..

Juergen

Or avoid the poo altogether... and just chuck a few granules of urea in every now and again...

or even better.... just pee in it yourself

im not sure id want ANY poop from sheep cows or horses.

Yep... works a treat...

Been busy at work, and also in expanding my system. More about this later.

I was suprised to see that my application of cat poo to duckweed tray attracted so much attention and comments. So, I should respond on this one first.

I am in the process of experiementing with duckweed growing, so am more concerned with successful growth than health issue. My duckweed tray is not connected to my aquaponic system, so no concern.

But in experimenting with poo, it is easier using cat poo than human one. I know the use of human poo is common in many developing countries. I have seen it being used in Korea when I was small. They probably stopped using it a long time ago. But its use may be coming back with environmental concern and organic farming idea. My cat is my son's two small kitten, only about three months old, and on strict diet control.
Their poo is easy to pick and collect for later use. That is why I thought I would try. But since there are strong opinions against its use, I will do some research on the issue when I have time and return to the debate.

Meanwhile, I have changed my duckweed tray to one that is more shallow, but of a larger surface area. This tray is placed in a shelf under the main grow bed: a space saver idea. Only partial sun, but seems to be OK.
I am now experiementing with growing various water plants together with duckweed. Water plants will be placed in my pond in rotation. I have already noticed that water lily in the fish pond attract dirt (a combination of fish poo and other rotting matters in pond). However when placed on a outside tray for a long time, water lily becomes clean. On the other hand , a different kind of algae like substance grow on the water lily pot, and fish likes to eat this. So this method serves two functions, of cleaning the plant, and supply an alternative source of food for fish.

On vegie growth: steady growth, but not explosive like some cases.
Now, it is becoming difficult to compare to previous week's growth because I planted some from other places to fill empty space in current grow beds.
The lettuce from seeds have grown well. It is not the kind I like, but I poured old seeds from an old seed envelope to get rid of them. The leaves are very thin. I will have to mow it once to see whether they grow again like grass.

The yogurt cut in the middle have horse radish seeds. I am anxious to see how well they grow since I read that they grow really well and my family like them.

The big news of this week is system expansion.
First, on gaining confidence from my first trial in aquaponic for last five weeks, I added two more grow beds. Plumbing is yet to be done. But they are placed on shelves that are higher than the current ones, so I plan to use gravity to channel water. It was found that the shelf frame was too long horizontally and bent (not so apparent in the last picture) by the weight of two growbeds with clay balls. I will have to place some supporting posts.

Another expansion is still under progress, but is of a major kind.
A three level shelving built with timber and steel posts along 12 m fence.Placed on the top shelve are 15 60L trays. I plan to have a long channel made with liner only with minimal necessary frame. Idea is open from plumbing, and I am not rushing to finish this part of expansion.
This part was made by the carpenter, Jeff, who built my pergola. I would say he did an excellent job. I am glad I asked him for this job rather than doing it myself. I would have done it myself if this house was an old one. But I wanted a more professional job since this is a new house.
Another picture below will provide a more panoramic view of my backyard.If you have been following the progress of my system, you would see that I have been following a plan that I made in January closely.
viewtopic.php?f=18&t=11530&start=75#p313658
Seen from living room, it looks like this:
Garden is to be integrated with living room. And "healing garden" is still the driving concept of this aquaponic system.

You may have noticed small toy figurines next to my grow beds. Here is a close up. I and my wife have a habit of never throwing away memorabilia, and these toys are about twenty years old. My newphew Ian from America used to collect them when he lived with us for two years. I thought I could put them for some useful role again, here in a conservatory made of water, fish, and edible plants, and the sound of water falling. They aquire a sort of life in this garden, or animistic spirit. They are a part of the population of this healing garden. One could almost feel their presence.

Another significant expansion was a new addition of fish.
After death of 30 silver perch fingerings, I have decided to stick with goldfish for a while so that I can focus on improving other aspects of my aquaponic system which include vegie growing success as well as an integrated expansion.
A couple of days ago, I got 100 small goldfish of about 3-6cm length. That makes my fish population about 135 goldfish. The old ones are about 15-20 cm long. Here is a picture. Small ones are still not aquainted with the feeder human being and still does not come to surface often.

I have used germination box, but for some reason, have not been successful. Of course, sprinkling seeds on a growbed is far easier of they sprout. In my case, not expecting it to succeed, I put too many seeds to closely, and on lettuce growing from seeds successfully, I found them gorwing too colsely each other too tensely. It was difficult to seperate some and plant in empty location.

Now that I saw that it was not difficult to grow from seeds, I think should plant an appropriate number with appropriate separation. The idea of using yogurst cup emerged here. I will droped 3 seeds on each yogurt cut, and plant these cups rather than seeds directly.

I have now added chopstick size sticks as stand and used small wire ties to tie spring onions to them. Without them, the tall and thin plant cannot stand.
Before using this method, I tried using transparent drink bottle by cuting top and bottom as a s ort of stand, but it was far more work and less efficient than the current method.

The poli roof for pergola for the table area was only completely last week. The choice of the roof material was one that cuts heat, but allow maximum light.
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=11657&p=312739&hilit=poli#p312739
Will I be able to grow vegie under this roof since it is said that light transmission is about 50%. equivalent to 50% shade cloth although it does not feel like it is 50%.
One idea for the use of above human height space under this roof is to have a series of nurient flow channels. Will this work? I am currently having a trial run of a grow tray with vegie and flower to see whether they grow well under this roof.
This idea was expressed in my January entry.
viewtopic.php?f=18&t=11530&start=30#p311818

This time, did not een bother having water test.
Probably, the same result as before.