Now this is a story, all about how my gardening got flipped-turned outside in and I'd like to take a minute just sit right there I'll tell you how I became the guy with a garden in his basement.
After researching aquaponics for a couple days (now I'm an expert, right?), I decided to try it in my basement. Wouldn't make much sense to start one outside if I want to grow through winter, I live in town and rent my house with not much lawn, so a greenhouse is out of the question. I nabbed a 50 gallon tote from Lowe's and a small feed trough from a local feed store after destroying several plastic totes that I intended to use as grow beds (that plastic is so brittle). I was impatient, so instead of ordering a pump online, I originally bought a sump pump, which turned out to be extremely loud, the motor sat outside of the water, and was way too much for what I needed, both in gph and $$. I instead realized that Lowe's has fountain pumps, which are significantly cheaper, and actually designed for this type of thing (100 gph as opposed to 800 or so, and $20 vs $90). I put together my first system, threw in a few plants from my garden, and dumped in a bunch of goldfish.
A few things I learned: you need a lot more gravel than you think, and cycling with fish is bad for the fish. I killed off probably 15 fish in the next couple weeks. I'm currently sitting at 14 tiny ones, that seem to be quite content now.
This is the grow bed a couple weeks ago. Cut some of the lettuce for the fajitas we made for dinner. The cantaloupe was an experiment, which I realize was a bad idea. Being a plant that needs pollination, hand-pollinating is a pain, and I have yet to get any of the flowers to turn into fruit, as well as the fact that the plant is huge in terms of length. I've also bumped up the lights from the original setup, and have a 6-bulb T8 4' system hanging a little less than a foot from the plants.
I decided that this wasn't enough, and a few weeks ago I decided that I wanted to grow strawberries as well as lettuce primarily, and also move on to raising fish I could one day eat. So I set out to set up a new system. If only I knew back then the trouble that I would have to go through to get everything set up. Originally my plan was to go with some 55 gallon barrels, and have two of those systems set up (2 FTs with 4 GBs). But in my searches online for cheap supplies, I found a guy selling an IBC tote for $35. Um, yes please. So I picked up said tote and 2 55 gallon barrels (to balance out my FT/GB ratio).
Looking back now, I should have stuck with the barrels only. First of all, IBC totes are pretty amazing for Aquaponics. The drain at the bottom is great for washing them out initially or later, the metal cage is great, the plastic base/stand is excellent for keeping it up off the cement floor, and the size is just right for a decent starter FT where I can actually have real fish. But for my case, the size was too much. The room in my basement had some rotting wood that the previous tenants had left in (my personal opinion is that they were growing something down there as well, but nothing legal), which required ripping out. That was a couple hours. Next, I couldn't fit the bottom part of the IBC tote through the opening into the room. The entrance to the room is right next to the stairs, and you have to duck to get into the room. Even with how flexible the plastic of the IBC is, I could not wedge it through the space. Being determined, I basically took apart the wall that was between the stairs and the room so I could get the tote through. Getting the cage through was another chore. I had to first take my back door off the frame to fit it through (because cutting through the metal once was annoying enough, I wasn't about to do it all over again just to trim a couple inches off). Then I had to very strategically wiggle it through the opened up wall (read: hit it with a hammer and judicial use of a crow-bar).
After that, there was the figuring out how to arrange the entire system. Probably something I should have done beforehand. Oops. Got a general plan laid out, and went to work. The barrels were a pain to figure out, because there isn't a lot of space where everything is, and the wall slants into the room for about a foot at the floor, so supporting the weight cheaply was a process. In the end, a bunch of cinder blocks were used, along with a 2x10. At one point, I had a barrel hanging from the floor joists by rope, but decided that was a little too risky and unstable.
Initially I tried to get away with not using any ball valves, and just adjusting flow rates by raising/lowering the ends of the supply tubes, but that proved quite the hassle. 3 $2 ball valves later, and the system finally was set up. Also put up the 4 bulb, 4' T5 lights that I got from Amazon for $75.
Lessons learned from this build: Plan more. In hindsight, the 55 gallon barrels would be better. Always buy more media than you think you'll need. I bought 10 bags initially, until I did the math and discovered I actually needed 30. #18 O-rings are your friend. Just because the high school aged employee at Lowe's says they don't have any O-rings for 3/4" PVC, ignore him. I tried using rubber washers that I had to cut to size. That was a pain, a waste of time, and a waste of money. For the gravel guards, 4" PVC is significantly more expensive than the smaller sizes. The big black pipes that they sell are like $4 for 10 ft, and the one I bought already had cuts in it, so I didn't have to do anything but cut them with scissors to 1 ft lengths, and then the excess makes for great fish hiding spots.
I plan to stock this system with Trout soon. Right now it's on the warm end of their water temps (sitting around 72-74), but the system is still cycling, and it should start getting cooler soon.
Some goals for the future:
-Finish wiring the room. Right now most of the power is being run into the basement by a long extension cord that is on the same circuit as my washer. I installed a new circuit breaker, but only one of the 3 outlets I hooked up works, so I need to get the other two working.
-Currently playing around with raising some worms, there are a couple of totes under the table with dirt, vegetable compost, and two different types of worms from a bait shop. Would like to be able to supplement the fish food with real worms, I've heard it improves the fish taste.
-Be more efficient with the outside light. The window behind the IBC tote is south facing, so it gets a decent amount of sunlight. During the night, I have to block the window so my neighbors don't get pissed off (it shines right at their back deck), but during the day I'm considering placing something reflective at an angle outside to reflect more light into the grow room, and possibly putting up some cheap plywood painted white or reflective plastic around the grow beds to collect more natural light (because electricity is expensive, and I am but a poor college student). Anyone have any experience with this or thoughts/tips/advice?
-I plan to keep both systems running separate, with the first, smaller system as a "testing grounds" for plants, and the IBC tote and barrels for specific crops in larger quantities.
Backyard Aquaponics
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