Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

A few pics from today

Sacrificial brocolli, where the parasitic wasps are doing their work and increasing their numbers- you can see affected aphids by their brown colouration


Lots of Kale, might have to make some chips or juice it, as it's fairly boring to eat straight


Time to make some more tabouli, with a few plants like this, there's a huge amount to eat!

Huge Romanesco brocolli plant over 1m across, with a large head in it, ready to harvest in a day or 2




Close up of the fractal form of the flowers

Wow! These were grown outside in the Winter, I guess you are in a temperate climate.Or have you a greenhouse? Those close-ups are outstanding, especially the Fractals in the flower shot. Thanks for sharing

Thanks Brian Yes, in the greenhouse, although it only has fruit fly netting on the ends, so is exposed to ambient temperature. The top cover is waterproof shade cloth, so it helps reduce flooding in heavy downpours. That plant was right at the end so gets rained on, and snowed on last month!

We've been eating rather a lot of them, so I blanched 4 caulis and one romanesco today, now frozen to enjoy at a later date

Sounds heavenly, we've both been running rough all Summer here, so we haven't given our gardens the attention they need. On top of that, the dietitian I saw after seeing the nephrologist (kidney specialist) gave me a list of food I should stay away from, if I don't want any more kidney stones. Unfortunately, half the the plants we planted in Spring are on that list, including Beets, one of my all time favorite foods. Next on the hit list is Spinach. I can't hardly bear to go in the section of the garden with a hundred beets So when I plant our brand new greenhouse for the first Winter crop here at home I'll need to tread carefully. Perhaps I'll do well with at least one DWC bed for lettuce.

I put the solar radiation shields up this morning, as the water got to 17.5C yesterday afternoon, and will probably get close to that again today, although with a smaller temp rise after a warm night -11C, and 24hr av temp to 9am on 17C. It's warm again today and tomorrow will be warmer again, before it cools down a bit.

Here it is, the big one!

Don't eat it all a once...

Nice one.

Some's going into a stir-fry tomorrow and the rest to the freezer

Wow.. Your set up is awesome. And so are the veg..thought I'd stop by and take a peek at your system get a few more tips and ideas, thanks for all your advice on my various postings and questions today!!

Thanks Appletree

I might see if I can get some seeds for that. It looks fantastic. What do you sell those for? I wouldn't think they would be a profitable item due to the harvest time and single harvest. I know you would have to get a pretty penny to compensate for how many lettuce you could grow in that GH space in the same time frame.

I'd be looking for $6 at the market for a head like that, not that I have been selling any, just freezing for our own consumption when I cant grow them in the warmer weather. I think I planted them in June and have been harvesting them for the past 3 weeks.

Chomp! a trout had a bite on my finger this afternoon! I had a handful of pellets and put my hand into the water with them, rather than throw them in, and one of the trout thought my finger looked more appetising

They haven't been as enthusiastic as usual about their food recently, so I held off until the afternoon before their first feed of the day, and that was enough encouragement to try something new- ie my finger

The banana is still touch and go for survival, there are a few small green patches, so perhaps it will pull through.

I've got some more seedlings to put in, in the space freed up by harvesting some of the broccolis, so will get them planted sometime in the next few days.

The one remaining Murray Cod still just hangs out at the bottom at the edge of the tank, it's significantly smaller than all the trout now.

I guess that's one plus for not being able to raise trout. My tilapia bite me daily, but they only gum you.