Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Nature has a way of teaching patience.... either that... or it slaps you in the face....

That's an interesting way to put it

For now I just test the water twice a week and do nothing further, water was salted to 3ppt (now it's more like 2.5ppt with all the rain). I didn't feed the fish yet and only added crushed egg shells to raise pH a bit, currently the pH is about 6.5

Sounds like you're on the right track Jaco with your system.

I need to go through the IBC of Aquaponics properly. I have gone through it lightly and I think it's a great book.

Unfortunately Rupe is right about the patience thing.

Some of the seeds that I planted a week ago germinated, some more patience needed till they are big enough for AP growbed.

Looks like the greenhouse thingy is working


Found this last night in the GB, looks like a oat seed.

Had some time this afternoon to continue working on a few things. Finished the FT lid, might add some insulation in future.


Drilled a 4mm drain hole in the standpipe so that I can put pump on a timer. Didn't want to cut the plug off the pump, might change things in the future, so I made a timer that looks like this:
For now I will run the pump from 8am (sunrise) to 5pm.

Did a ammonia test again, still under 0.25mg/l. This time it looks like it's less than it was a week ago

Repurposed pallet? Awsome!

Recycled pallet wood is the best thing since sliced bread.

Just to update every one: My system is going well, as far as I can see the fish are still alive, lost peas due to high winds so have some more small ones going in GB, transplanted broad beans on wednesday and they look very happy. Seedlings in trays are growing very well, unfortunately they are not yet big enough for GB, planted more peas in tray too, should be able to transplant most seedlings in 2 weeks.

Going to get 100m of black poly pipe tomorrow for a solar water heater, need to get water temp up so that fishes can start to eat and plants to grow faster (hopefully). Is there any danger of chemicals leaching into water from poly irrigation pipe? Going to pump water through solar heater resonably fast, so temp shouldn't get to high in pipes, total system water temp will most likely not get above 25-30C.

Usually irrigation pipe is polyethylene, so no worries.

Thanks Ron, thats good news, will post images when done with solar heater.

That's great Jaco, would love to see photos of how it is progressing.

Edit: lol, your response came through as I was posting a request for photos!

Martin.

G'day Jaco, nice work on the system so far.

I noticed there was no definitive answer to this question, perhaps you could try two samples, one heated and one not and see if you get the same result.

Thanks, I will do 2 ammania tests later today and post my findings.

Got 100m of 15mm LDPE irrigation pipe this morning for solar heater.
Only in the mood for building 2 today, will do another one tomorrow. Pump is a bit small so i removed the spraybar after I added socond coil, might need a bigger pump when I add another coil.


For now I connected the coils in series, getting only 3C higher water out than in FT.

Broad beens grow about 1cm per day, new peas are going slowly.