Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

if you get too many cucumbers you can pickle them small.

Also you can pinch off the growing tips of the vine and keep it a bit more compact. This tends to make the existing fruit get all the energy as well.

I still haven't got around to buying a little paint brush so I'm struggling with my cucumber pollination, but it think I managed to get one past the danger stage.

Hi all,
I have been very busy even on weekends, and still am.
Here are some updates in two weeks.
Now it is the 8th weeks for the grow beds in the high shelve. These are about 2 metres abov ground. The water output from thr grow beds in this shelve goes down to two grow beds in the lower shelve, which are about 150cm above ground, and also above fish pond (50cm underground, and 40cm above ground).
Today's report is on the grow bed in the high shelve whcih started with seeds, bok choi, muzuna, and lettuce, and some others.
The pictures show reasonably successful results for growth from seeds.
Bok choi grew so nicely, so that I now see that there will be no need to buy seedlings.

Mizuna, in the lower picture, which I am not used to eat, but was planted because of its Japanese name, grew tall, and I tried eating it as a part of salad together with lettuce. Did not have any distinct taste, not like water cress. I was rather disappointed since it grew well and raised an expectation of having one more variety of plant with distinctive taste to add to salad. It is rather different the Korean one with a similar look which I was hoping to be similar.

Cucumber pollination and growth have been reasonably successful. I now have quite a few edible size cucumber.

Fortunately, new ones keep emerging continuously.

However, there is a problem. For some reason, there flowers do not open well and for long.
This is true for both the male (the one with cucumber) but especcially true for the female ones.
Basically, the situation now is that I rarely have female flowers open so that I can take their pollen. I tried to open some closed flower forcely and rub my brush at the bottom of flower near the pollen area, then again forcefully open the male flower, and rub the brush at the bottom of the flower. Many of the male flowers on baby cucumber fall before I can do this. Therefore baby cucumber dies.
It is rather disappointing to see this happening since the baby cucumbers keep emerging.

Long horse radish (daikon in Japanese, growing near 30cm long) is something my family consume a lot. So I bought three different varieties from Bunnings. It is said that they are for all seasons and grow well from seeds.
I planted to different kinds, the long one (daikon) and another kind that I a bit shorter.
They were right both kinds grew well.For dikon, I put three seeds in a yogurt cup thiking that I would pull out two weaker ones when sprouts come up. But I did not, so I have three in each cup. As diakon grew, the yogurt cup split because of the expansion of multiple dikon in each cup.

As for another kind of horse radish, I planted in a growbed in the high shelve without using the yogurt cup. It looks different since it is a different kind. But growth seems reasonable. So, it seems that I now have established a constant supply of one more vegitable for home consumption.

A brief report on the condition of gold fish.
I began to have fungus problem perhap about 5-6 weeks ago.
I have tried mainly three things: 1] changing water, 2] salt bath in a quaranteen container, and 3] adding melafix in pond water.
More heavily infected ones were moved to the quaranteen container, then moved after one or two weeks to the pond.
Unfortunaly, the fungus problem is still there, and I do not know a better way to handle this problem. Some small goldies died. Big ones do not die easily, but some are "heavily" infected.
I have increased the salt dose, to 120ml for 30L of water, already several weeks ago.
But no obvious improvement.
I am too buy these days to do more research on this problem to come up with a better method of treating fish with fungus problem. I would like to add more fish, but am waiting until the condition of fish becomes better.

When I look at some big fish with serious fungus problem, it feels like parents looking at own child with skin disease, crying from itchness, but not able to help the child.
And too busy!!

You know what I mean ...

Fish will have to wait, though I would not be able to make a child to wait.

Sejin

Almost 2 months since update. How's things going?

Yep i want a update with pics.


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I have been away from Backyard Aquaponics for nearly three years. Just checking whether I am still a valid member.

you seem valid to me, but what do I know?

Sorry about the shoes thing.

It's been three years? Where does the time go?

Welcome back!

How's the system ticking along?

Some updates since three years ago. I worked on expansion of my system only now and then when I had time. But the net change is substancial. It has to be compared to the state three years ago. The most notable is shelves along the fence. Then made a deck. <br /><br /><br /><br /><br/>

My pond and aquaponic garden are a couple of meters away from living room seen through a long glass wall meant to be an extension of the living room.<br /><br /><br /><br/>

I am hoping to make some expansion over this summer. But I need to learn to manage fish better. No success with perch so far. Gold fish is a safe bet. But I would like to add another safe bet.