Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Actually the top of a wicking bed is fairly dry unless it rains (at least that's the way mine are).

That's what I was thinking.. so it must be possible to replicate that with a very low level of flow from the fish tank. I might not get anywhere with this but I think it's worth a try.

The wicking apparently will max out at around 300 mm (roughly 12 inches) depending on the media of course. Hope you get it working - watch out for fungus gnats if the media stays too wet (mostly just a nuisance).

Thanks Scotty

Some sort of bug I found on a lettuce plant, never seen one before... any ideas?

Looks like a yellow crab spider.


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I thought it might be some sort of a tick, shows how much I know about bugs..

A few more pics, plants seem to be doing Ok, the beans, tomatoes, capsicum and cucumber have started to appear. Beetroot are coming along well I think, I don't actually know how long they should take but I'm seeing growth from weeks past so I'm happy

What about plumbing a line off the main supply and using controlled irrigation drippers? just a thought

That's a good idea battzNZ I'm going to build a mesh type planter box approximately 100mm shorter in length and width of the grow bed and about 100mm higher than the top and leave a base of gravel in the grow bed (approximately 50mm), put the planter box in and back fill around the sides with more gravel. I will have the water level adjustable until I can find the sweet spot. then hope that it works

Update. I used some Corflute for my DWC beds, it needed support in the middle but seems reasonably strong otherwise. It's UV stabilized and non toxic according to the manufacturers so we'll see how long it lasts. I've set it up Kratky style with no additional aeration so I don't know how it will go but I wanted to keep power usage to a minimum.

wow pro job

Thanks Jay, kinda funny really, crap growth so far

Do you have your IBC's covered with paint?
Do you have nitrates?

No paint, but no algae neither
Nitrates are 80 - 160 ppm.
pH is 7.8 and hasn't moved for ages so I think it's stopping the nutrient uptake, have just planted seedlings in the DWC and about to put more in the gravel media beds and hopefully my pH will start to drop. Haven't put any top up water in for about a month, only fresh rainwater has fallen into the system and kept the water levels topped up.