Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Small celery seedlings went in in mid July and were transplanted to a different GB on 30/7.
Save the ag lime for the dirt garden, and use Ca(OH)2 hydrated lime! 10 or 20g per day will do as much as buckets of CaCO3 will.
I've been adding KOH and or Ca(OH)2 each day to bring my pH back up a bit. The trout are eating quite well again, especially today, being on target for over 300g, 250g so far! Currently using a 50/50 mix of 5 and 7mm pellets.

Right, I thought weight for weight it was the same stuff they just oxidised at different rates. Bugger cause I have bags of it. I will pop into the hardware next week and get the hydrated stuff. Still no basil. I've gone thru 3 packets, going to have a lawn of it when it finally comes up.

Daily max and min temperatures continue to be well above average this month, but I'm managing to keep the water temperature at reasonable levels. Today was supposed to be low 30s again, but it is overcast and has only been up to 25C by midday, saving me from potentially my highest water temp so far. The strong and gusty wind isn't doing the plants any good though.
In the past week I didn't use any of my store of ice, but did shade the GBs a bit more than previously. I ran the pump all night on 8/10, and have it running most of the time between 3am and 7am every day, daytime is mostly 20on/40off and the rest of the time its 30/30. With the warm weather, evaporation is fairly high, so water additions have dropped the salinity a couple of times from its gradual increase.

The trout have eaten an average of 285g of 5&7mm pellets each day for the past 7 days, with a high of 330g yesterday. That has required the addition of 95g Ca(OH)2 and 140g of KOH to neutralise, and give me a slight decrease in acidity from pH 6.33 to pH 6.67 over the week.

They ate some maggots for the first time today- about 100 wasp maggots from the worm farm were gradually dropped into the FT over about 5 minutes, and all were consumed within about 10 seconds, as they sank.



During the week I planted a couple more capsicums, and a punnet of chives, and picked 5 bunches of chard for sale or our own consumption, as well as sold 2 celery plants. The chooks had their usual supply of chard leaves too, something they really look forward to because the chookyard has almost no green grass due to the hot dry weather.


An experiment showed my test heat exchanger was not up to the task, so I'll be paying a visit to a local air conditioner/refrigeration business who should be able to help me out with the modifications I want to do to the portable AC unit I'll be using to cool the FT water.

When you say salinity has decreased do you mean because adding the water is diluting it? I'm not sure if you've noticed with your chard but mine tastes so salty I give it away with a warning not to add salt. Celery has more salt so maybe we're losing more than we think through produce. Might need to give warnings to people with high blood pressure.

For the 1st time in my gardening history I'm giving away my produce not just to be generous, but because I'm so sick of the stuff I can't stand to look at it. Not a bad position to be in! Maybe next year when I have more time I will start selling the stuff. I'm having a crack at wicking garden beds so I can successfully start growing more variety ( root veg etc) for sale with my duck eggs which I am also sick of

Yes, salinity dipping down on the graph each time I add water after noticing the sump water level is getting too low- but no doubt some salt is going with the vegetables too. My chard isn't so salty now I'm down to 1.12ppt salinity, from 3ppt a few months ago. Most of that drop went with water I removed from the system to drop Nitrates down, and was used on the apricot, cherry and apple trees.
I know what you mean about the duck eggs! I'm thinking about making another huge batch of duck egg custard this arvo
We have about 2 cartons of duck eggs in the fridge ATM, there are about 20 in their house that we are hoping will be sat on and hatched by one of them (we have 3 + 1 drake), and we sold the 11 ducklings to the restaurant that runs the organic market yesterday.
I put in a punnet of multi-coloured carrots a week and a half ago, I hope they grow into something useful in the GBs, but may have to set up some wicking beds at some stage. I also put the top of a turnip into a GB the other day, chopped off one that went into compost after being in the fridge too long, and it seems to be coming to life.

Oh, I've also been harvesting and eating some broccoli, although it has only been fairly small heads, and also the last of the first batch of spring onions has now been harvested and eaten, but plenty more is coming along nicely

My ducks have no interest in their eggs, luckily my silkies are silly enough to sit on them for me but that Is a discussion for another forum, sorry I keep hijacking your threads!

I planted some purple carrots from seeds, they are coming up ok but won't know how straight until harvest time.

Basil, watermelon, rockmelon, spaghetti squash still not germinating. Talk about a watched pot! Beans have sprouted, need to find something suitable for them to climb as the trellis I had for the peas I think might be too fine.

Raddicio is thriving but very green, probably healthier but not the pretty red & white it should be. I probably should blanch it next time.

Will you be growing your chard through summer?

I'll keep the chard going for a while yet, after I do a daylight survey of the damage from the severe winds in the storms this evening. I just had a quick look, lots more stems snapped off, but everything is generally intact in the AP system, although I did take precautions earlier when I knew what was coming. There are some branches down from trees near the house, pot plants spread around etc, and I wouldnt be surprised if the road to town is blocked with fallen trees or large branches. The end section of waterproof shadecloth on the roof of the greenhouse is showing signs that it will need a bit more work soon, the rope I have over it from the last big wind event isn't enough.

Not many of the few seeds I've planted in the GBs came up, probably about 50%, I've had much greater success with seedlings.

With the high wind and rapidly dropping pressure this arvo, the fish weren't interested in eating, hopefully they will be back into the pellets tomorrow, and some maggots if I can find some in the worm farm.

I keep giving mine cabbage moth caterpillars but they've never taken to them. I'm at work and have no idea how the winds are hope there isn't too much damage for you. Hope you got some decent rain.

Yep.. my trout fed well this morning... but were totally disinterested this evening... even the perch were off the bite as well...

Tank temps should drop back a bit overnight with some cooler air behind the front... for a day anyway

They should eat well tomorrow morning...

"Murray cod have also been known to eat ducks, cormorants, freshwater tortoises, water dragons, snakes, mice and frogs"

There's one use for the ducks. What does it taste like? Just read the largest on record was 1.8m and over 100 kg. work out yr stocking rates for that one! That's a mental fish fir an AP system. Can't wait to read yr thread...

Haha, I dont think I'll be around in the 50 or so years it takes for them to get that big! I haven't eaten it since i was at school, can't really remember how it tastes, but I think the word delicious has been used to describe it

Three pics from Saturday

Tomatoes and corn



Celery



Overall view

Hi mate, great set up.
What and why is that white stuff on the gb's.

LOL quick glance at the one pic looked like snow!

It is insulation. It stops the GB surface, and the water below it, from heating up so much in the sun. The shiny stuff around the GBs is Aircell insulation, which I need to cover up before the UV destroys it. It isn't doing a huge amount of insulation, but does form a reflective barrier to the sun on the sides of the GBs. Sun on there was adding a lot of heat to the system.
The outside GB with tomatoes and corn has some hemp fibre and cotton sheet to keep the gravel and clay balls cool, only slightly less effectively.