Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hello,

Does anyone know if a dutch/Bato bucket works best full of media or with a netpot in the lid holding the media and the rest full of water more like a dwc? I'm lookingat adding a couple of 25L buckets to my system over summer for tomatoes and capsicums and cant seem to find much information on how to build them.

Also what kind of flow rate do they require? i'd prefer to just run water constantly through them but most info seems to point to having emitters and running water for only a couple of minutes at a time...

Thanks a bunch in advance.

I have a design for 25 gal tubs, 8 vertical sidewall planting holes, plus plants in the top.

The reservoir in the bottom holds 7 gals. of water, the design doesn't require rocks in the reservoir, the water is wicked up into the soil-less media by Micro-Fiber wicks.

I have only tried bato buckets (15-25L buckets and square planters) as media based - both as clay balls and a mini-wicking system (rocks in bottom and shade cloth seperator). I have used DWC using small 40-50Litre rectangular but only for lettuce.
My thoughts would be:
(a) DWC really relies upon aeration, circulation and oxygen being in the water, that may be harder to achieve in a multi-bucket and any need for aerating every bucket that would make a larger container more viable*.
(b) It depends on how important filtering is. Clay balls, rock etc provide bio-filtering and a host media for bacteria.
DWC systems would be less so - so buckets and DWC are often a side/parallel system to a GB.
(c) no reason bato buckets cannot be continuously run - they would be constant flood or timer drain. I went to them for tomatoes mainly because their roots dominated my small grow beds and I get better growth and more productive plants via the buckets (plus I can add additional nutrients and replant etc much easier).
(d) IMO circulation is the main issue with buckets, so you want to try and have new water entering the top and old water leaving the bottom. I used to use sump pipes inside the bucket** but a good trick from the wicking bed guys was to put the outlet at bottom and then have a rotatable arm that allows control of water level - I am going to try that this year.
(e) for tomatoes my opinion is that they prefer having roots in a media - but I am sure there is evidence that they grow in DWC (that presumes support for the plant).

* I suspect you would have to look at the air gap method anyway
** 90 degree bend immediately inside with pipe that went to bottom of bucket.

that is often just a convenience when they are a side system and a bonus when you are adding nutrients. Is why I like them as I run a small pump with a timer parallel to a FT-GB system and fill the buckets less frequently as they are not the primary system filter.

The main issue will be how many buckets you are feeding and keeping a reasonable flow into each of them and then back to your FT. I use 15mm PVC pipe with holes drilled in them rather than lots of reticulation. And can vary hole size.

There was a thread that discussed that - viewtopic.php?f=1&t=23861
and also viewtopic.php?f=1&t=25330.

I have plenty of flow at the moment and enough filtration in the main grow bed for the fish I have so the Buckets will be a side addition just to allow me to grow more plants over spring/summer and be easier to remove from the system(I'm in a rental and don't really want to add another IBC or half barrel grow bed as I will have to move it one day, the lighter the growbed the better at this stage).

So if I make the bucket with the elbows do i just fill it with media and the water level just stays at the bottom inch or so? I am planning on using Scoria as my media so not sure how high well it will wick the water, or does this not matter with the water constantly flowing from the top?

buckets should be ideal and you should get as good if not better return than a grow bed.


it does not really matter either way as you are constant flow.

if you keep water level lower then you will rely more on the water flowing from the top of the bucket to keep the scoria and roots moist/wet - so the inflow would have to suit that purpose. Else just treat it like a mini grow bed and have the water level at least say 10cm below the surface.

IMO if I had a 300-400 bucket I would aim for water level to be 1/3 to 1/2 (ie. 100-200mm)
you may have to use a higher water level initially for seedlings until the root ball gets established.

as per the other threads on Dutch Buckets it is simple to use a ball valve tap to control the flow rate for your feed pipes. [I use one ball valve and 15mm pvc with holes drilled in - adjust either size of or number of holes to get equal flows for each buckets].

This is basically way I have been setting my systems up.
15mm PVC feed pipe controlled by a ball valve and just 6-10mm holes in pipe.

(a) is a simple tube, the clear soft plastic works well as it does not require glueing.
works OK but you do get a 'dead zone' at the bottom.
you can push pipe to bottom BUT you cannot have a long outflow as it creates a siphon.
it can get blocked easily.

(b) can do this with 13mm or 19mm black garden reticulation pipe, or 15mm PVC
It is what I did but I now think it was a bit of overkill.

(I use it for my flower box rectangular planters though and it is effective - viewtopic.php?f=18&t=23874)

(c) is probably what I am going to do with my new buckets I have got for this year.
Got the idea from the wicking bed posts. Can easily change height and drains from bottom.

Thanks for all the info. C looks like the way to go. Do I need to put something between the pipe work in the bucket and the media to stop blockages?

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not really separation, but need to protect the holes - any option you can think of will work.

I usually put pipe in pipe. Or you could wrap it in coarse shadecloth or similar.
Mainly you need small gaps to stop the media and bits from going in to the pipe
(small clay balls clogging pipes has been the main issue for me).

With C I will push the pipe into a 20mm or 25mm pipe with either slots or holes and lay it along bottom of bucket.
Then make sure there are multiple holes in the pipe inside the bucket so the blocking of 1 or 2 does not matter to discharge.

Having pipe on outside should make it easy to pull off and clean/clear if outflow drops off.

Heres how I do mine

Its a bucket in a bucket ,That way you can change buckets clean out pipes ect ect without disturbing pipe work
Right at the left of the photo you will see the riser that way you can adjust the water level
Beeing all joined together if one plant uses more water it just refills from the other pots
this system is filled from the sump once a day and as you can seethes seem to be doing ok

I think I have decided in how to build my buckets I'm going to put a 20l pail inside another 20l pail.

The top pail will have holes drilled in the bottom and filled with scoria.

The bottom pail will have a 19mm ldpe poly pipe back to the sump.

Any idea how many buckets I could put on a sing run with 19mm poly as the drain?

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are you going to feed from the top or flood/fill from bottom like [I think] F&F does.

from top then basically case of flow rate in balancing flow rate out.

if part of bottom then excess will simply flow through - F&F only tops his up once a day.

[it would depend on whether buckets are just an aside or whether you need flow through for filtering]

Constant flow from the top

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Will be using 19mm poly barbed into my main slo line for the feed so it should be all gravity feed.

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only think to watch is that 19mm poly gets clogged easier than PVC. (esp. on the SLO)

main issue is that poly has internal fittings (ie. they reduce internal flow profile and can become blockage points).
PVC fittings go on outside. maybe 15mm or 20mm PVC might work better.