Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Gday everybody,

Recently, it was bought to my attention that nitrogen is better taken up by plants as ammino acids than as nitrates, as plants taking up nitrogen as nitrates produce lower quality produce in respect to human health and to some degree have a detrimental impact.

Providing the correct bacteria is present in the grow beds, and able to live on the plant roots, then nitrogen should be able to be taken up as ammino acids improving the quality of produce.

It would be interesting to find out what you guys think about this, as all ive seen is the basic ammonia - nitrite - nitrate flow chart involving some bacteria, are these bacteria capable of converting nitrogen to ammino acids? If not which ones could be used...

thanks for any imput

If the study you are referring to relates to a natural plant uptake ... ie bacteria in soil convert nitrites/nitrates to ammino acids then it would seem that this is a natural process....

Or was there specific growing conditions and specific bacterii introduced to the experiment???

Wondering if in fact this process is the actual process taking place anyway??

I received the information on soil health at a field day through a speaker from Quantum Ag Solutions. The reason for my concern was that in really healthy soil, the roots form nodules which are able to convert the the nitrogen to ammino acids, where as in unhealthy soil, or in soil with large amounts of nitrogen added this wont occur and the plant just draws up excessive amounts of nitrates.
I did ask the question at the time and was told that aquaponics may not have suitable conditions for this process to occur.

Just checking some notes...(Steve you're the Nitrogen cycle expert)

From a simple guide to the Nitrogen Cycle

Isn't the conversion of nitrates to amino acid what would be occurring in our growbeds??



And Conversion of Amino Acids



Suggests to me that in an AP system this is exactly the balance which is ultimately achieved ....

I noted the reference to the effect that drying had on bacteria...

A fact that some people have observed when their growbeds have dried out for one reason or another....

As i understand it plants convert the nitrate back to ammonia which they then utilise to make amino acids.
Plants can take up ammonia, but as it oxides so quickly it tends to vanish before the plants get a chance to grab it.
Nitrates are much more abundant and available thanks to the nitrobactor/nitrosomas

I read somewhere that Tom Speraneo (of S&S Aqua fame) discovered (or at least postulated) that the bacteria were able to transport nutrients across the pH barrier. His plants were thriving at pH levels that were supposed to be lethal to those certain plants because certain nutrients would be tied up by the pH. I was hoping that the book Paula sent me would have more detailed information but alas, no.

Anyway, it seems that some very interesting things happen when you grow plants in a biofilter. We may well observe phenomena that contradict current scientific thought.

I think AP is closer to soil than chemical hydro, it has a lot in common regarding plant/bacteria relationships.
If plants can grab amino acids direct from the medium it would save the energy of one conversion step.
Being in direct competition with microbes and bacteria means they probably lose out most of the time though, which is why some plants have a give and take relationship with fungus (mycorrhizae) and the like.

Mother nature is pretty clever at spreading the wealth

You would think so providing that the inorganic nitrate isnt being drawn up by the plant before the nitrate reductase convert it into an organic ammonia compound including amino acids.
The ability for the bacteria to convert the nitrate to organic amino acid would be reduced if the root zone and bacteria were exposed to excessive quantities of nitrates, dont you think ? or if simarly the effectivness of the bacteria was reduced by grow beds drying out ?

I've read that the microbes in the soil actually feed the plants -- not the chemical fertilizers. And that when we think the plant was "burned" by too strong an application -- it may actually be that we killed or seriously disrupted certain microbes in the soil.

What I appreciate about AP is that we're "letting" nature work rather than trying to force it.

After I get my greenhouse up and running, I'll try some experiments with magnets and electric currents -- based on my previous research. I don't believe anyone understands the total complexity of plant health,growth and nutrient uptake.

wow, we've stepped it up a notch!

I've a few things to say.

Rupert has gone most of the way in saying that this is probably what happens anyway. Thanks for the info with the enzyme.

You can run AP on very little nitrate, i'm not going to go over how again
So thats that taken care of. The enzymes will be produced by the plants and the and bacteria will be present anyway. So if all that is requied for it to "happen" is low nitrate levels then run low nitrate levels!

Its sort of weird for me, i was always a a bullet point, analyse, must have hard data / must quantify sort of person. AP has broken me out of this mind set for the simple reason that we can only quantify what we know about and i know that we do not know everything (read that twice!)

It would certainly be another explaination of a MATURE system kicking ass!

Great info guys and great discussion.

AT the very least it is a reason for us to run lowwer nitrates. As mentioned in my thread my tommies were grown and harvested on VERY minimal nitrates

Oh, and also, why would quantum ag, speaking on soil health, be "qualified" to make an edict on AP?

This info is yet another reason that i will continue to favour gravel growbeds, plenty of water plenty of oxygen, and if we wish to promote oxidation reactions we need oxygen, plus it give a home to all the little ezymes and bacteria that no doubt we will slowly quantify (they don't really mind if we know about them or not )

Well put Steve, I am still being amazed at how an AP system works as it does and keep learning more everyday, especially from contributions made here by all members

Can't wait to read about the application of magnetic fields on AP

Quick delete it! what have you done LES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! you'll turn this forum into a tin hat forum....ok, so where do we start, alternating mag fields or stationary. how many tesla?

Quick, someone else hook up with a a HV field............

i'll not admit to having spent sleepless nights in my youth (i can say that now becasue i'm 30 ) looking up stuff like that. I have a great site for it to............

In researching ways to use brackish water from a deep well to grow plants, I ran across some very interesting information. Some of it spooky. Like Hieronymus Galen growing plants without light. eloptic energy... I looked at test results from magnetic, catalytic, and HV (AC and DC) electrical treatment systems. Plenty of snake oil salesmen but also lots of "debunkers" who were short on facts themselves.
I talked at length with a man in Texas named Bud Thomason who claimed to have worked with Galen and continued research in the same vein. He told me he had used eloptic energy to do some amazing things -- including keeping water from freezing at subzero temperatures, growing a tomato from flower to 3" ripe fruit in 6 hours, raising vegetables on sea water, growing plants distilled water hydroponcially. Some of his claims were hard to believe, but what little I was able to test collaborated his claims. So I don't have any reason to disbelieve him.

I even considered moving to Texas and asking for a job as his research assistant -- but he had just heard about the "Joe cell" and was all excited about ZPE and so I figured I might be safer in Alaska.

emsjoflo, re joe cell.......................pm me. was part of discussion board many years ago, most info has seemed to have vanished.

See les! what did i tell ya! now we're going to have to start up a crack-pot section....................................

crack pot is already a member LOL

... personally I believe pyramids channel energy much more effectively