Contemplating Wicking Beds - Aquaponic Gardening2024-03-29T15:46:22Zhttps://aquaponicgardening.ning.com/forum/topics/contemplating-wicking-beds?groupUrl=wicking-bed-growers&commentId=4778851%3AComment%3A367027&groupId=4778851%3AGroup%3A329626&feed=yes&xn_auth=noI have been growing potato's…tag:aquaponicgardening.ning.com,2012-08-22:4778851:Comment:3856012012-08-22T20:50:37.002ZBob Terrellhttps://aquaponicgardening.ning.com/profile/BobTerrell
<p>I have been growing potato's in tires and tomatoes for about twenty years. I'm still here, lol. One thing I have done to cut down the summer heat on the soil is to paint the tires white.<br></br> <br></br> <cite>Paul Smith said:</cite></p>
<blockquote cite="http://community.theaquaponicsource.com/forum/topics/contemplating-wicking-beds?groupUrl=wicking-bed-growers&#4778851Comment361481"><div><div class="xg_user_generated"><p>I would like to see HARD DATA about the health concerns about using…</p>
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<p>I have been growing potato's in tires and tomatoes for about twenty years. I'm still here, lol. One thing I have done to cut down the summer heat on the soil is to paint the tires white.<br/> <br/> <cite>Paul Smith said:</cite></p>
<blockquote cite="http://community.theaquaponicsource.com/forum/topics/contemplating-wicking-beds?groupUrl=wicking-bed-growers&#4778851Comment361481"><div><div class="xg_user_generated"><p>I would like to see HARD DATA about the health concerns about using tires as a grow container. There has been a lot of talk on other forums, but no hard data, just conjecture. I know of people who have been using tire gardens for years and there doesn't seem to be any difference in their health or the quality of vegetables produced.</p>
<p>As a missionary to Haiti, I have been encouraging the use of tire gardens for years because tires are one of the few resources available, many times free or real cheap.</p>
<p>Thanks for the input and keep up the interest, Paul.<br/> <br/> <cite>TCLynx said:</cite></p>
<blockquote cite="http://aquaponicscommunity.com/forum/topic/show?groupUrl=wicking-bed-growers&id=4778851%3ATopic%3A360595&xg_source=msg#4778851Comment360851"><div><div class="xg_user_generated"><p>There has been some debate over the safety of using tires in the food garden. You might want to research the leaching possibilities so you can make your own informed decision before you set your heart on them.</p>
<p>I like the idea of using tires filled with rammed earth or whatever as retaining wall and such but I would rather not have them in contact with the moist food growing media.</p>
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<p>If worms want to escape, they will (or they die trying,) if you create a pleasant environment for them, they tend to stay even if you are not trying to contain them.</p>
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</blockquote> Yep. Of course many people ha…tag:aquaponicgardening.ning.com,2012-07-16:4778851:Comment:3670272012-07-16T15:48:03.716ZTCLynxhttps://aquaponicgardening.ning.com/profile/TCLynx
<p>Yep. Of course many people have to screw it up at least once in designing a set up. it is often tempting to cram as much stuff into a space as possible and it isn't until the plants have turned the place into a jungle that you realize there is no space to work. Now for personal consumption the work of harvest and planting isn't usually so labor intensive that it makes as much of a difference but as soon as you are trying for even super minimal commercial scale, it becomes very important to…</p>
<p>Yep. Of course many people have to screw it up at least once in designing a set up. it is often tempting to cram as much stuff into a space as possible and it isn't until the plants have turned the place into a jungle that you realize there is no space to work. Now for personal consumption the work of harvest and planting isn't usually so labor intensive that it makes as much of a difference but as soon as you are trying for even super minimal commercial scale, it becomes very important to make harvest and planting operations very efficient. I think perhaps this one point could be the primary deciding factor in the scalability of a home/backyard system into commercial operation. At my old place my system was capable of producing enough to sell, however, the labor involved in planting/harvesting the produce in that system was not efficient because of the layout of the space since that system grew kinda organically into the space available on my small residential lot. I'm keeping planting and harvesting efficiency and space to move garden carts about in mind while setting up the new systems.</p> Got your point, crystal clear…tag:aquaponicgardening.ning.com,2012-07-16:4778851:Comment:3669332012-07-16T14:40:12.673ZRichard Monghttps://aquaponicgardening.ning.com/profile/RichardMong
<p>Got your point, crystal clear. I think it's one of those things you don't screw up very often, because you'll find yourself quite alone otherwise, and suffering the consequences.</p>
<p>Got your point, crystal clear. I think it's one of those things you don't screw up very often, because you'll find yourself quite alone otherwise, and suffering the consequences.</p> Right, I was basically saying…tag:aquaponicgardening.ning.com,2012-07-16:4778851:Comment:3667582012-07-16T13:28:48.908ZTCLynxhttps://aquaponicgardening.ning.com/profile/TCLynx
<p>Right, I was basically saying make sure you have a "tip zone or landing zone" where you can lay out a tarp so when you knock the potato stacks over and harvest the potatoes after you move the tires out of the way and harvest all the potatoes you can then bundle up the tarp and lift the used media into a worm bin or collect it for re-use with the next potato stack or whatever.</p>
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<p>If you don't leave yourself ample space next to the potato wicking stacks to do this, you will…</p>
<p>Right, I was basically saying make sure you have a "tip zone or landing zone" where you can lay out a tarp so when you knock the potato stacks over and harvest the potatoes after you move the tires out of the way and harvest all the potatoes you can then bundle up the tarp and lift the used media into a worm bin or collect it for re-use with the next potato stack or whatever.</p>
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<p>If you don't leave yourself ample space next to the potato wicking stacks to do this, you will probably be kicking yourself later (or perhaps more likely whoever is stuck trying to cope with it may want to kick you even more.)<a style="cursor: pointer;"><img src="http://www.bkserv.net/images/Smile.gif"/></a></p> Hello TC,
I'm pretty good at…tag:aquaponicgardening.ning.com,2012-07-16:4778851:Comment:3669272012-07-16T13:21:43.834ZRichard Monghttps://aquaponicgardening.ning.com/profile/RichardMong
<p>Hello TC,</p>
<p>I'm pretty good at tipping things over and demolishing them. Not so good at building things. The grow media for the potatoes, as I contemplate it at this moment, will be the media that I use to filter fine suspended solids in my aquaponics system (coir and rice husks). To this I'll add worm castings and some worms, as necessary. When a batch of potatoes is harvested, the remaining media, I think, should go to the worm bins for complete transformation to castings. It all…</p>
<p>Hello TC,</p>
<p>I'm pretty good at tipping things over and demolishing them. Not so good at building things. The grow media for the potatoes, as I contemplate it at this moment, will be the media that I use to filter fine suspended solids in my aquaponics system (coir and rice husks). To this I'll add worm castings and some worms, as necessary. When a batch of potatoes is harvested, the remaining media, I think, should go to the worm bins for complete transformation to castings. It all sounds nice but it will be really nice if it actually works. I wouldn't suggest this approach if you can't get coir (cheap here) and rice husks (free at the moment) economically. But as I've studied the UVI system until it can't be studied any more, I don't see the point of using orchard netting and washing away all those nutrients every week. Thanks again for your input.</p> Just make sure to plan your p…tag:aquaponicgardening.ning.com,2012-07-16:4778851:Comment:3668252012-07-16T12:38:32.066ZTCLynxhttps://aquaponicgardening.ning.com/profile/TCLynx
<p>Just make sure to plan your potato "tip" zone so that kicking over the stacks for harvest won't be a big problem. Being able to place a tarp where you will tip the stack over should help you collect the planting media for re-use instead of making a mess right next to the bed where the nice planting "dirt" will simply get trampled and wasted.</p>
<p>Just make sure to plan your potato "tip" zone so that kicking over the stacks for harvest won't be a big problem. Being able to place a tarp where you will tip the stack over should help you collect the planting media for re-use instead of making a mess right next to the bed where the nice planting "dirt" will simply get trampled and wasted.</p> Hello Chris,
Thanks for the f…tag:aquaponicgardening.ning.com,2012-07-16:4778851:Comment:3667222012-07-16T04:41:10.548ZRichard Monghttps://aquaponicgardening.ning.com/profile/RichardMong
<p>Hello Chris,</p>
<p>Thanks for the feedback. I realize I can go even lower tech, but I've got to start somewhere. The tires should be easy to get, but I don't actually have any. The reason why I plan on using river gravel (roundish) is that the reservoir should be able to hold more water that way. I don't live at the site; it's sort of a great, big playground for me. In fact, it's a 12 hour drive from my home in Vientiane, Laos, and about 3 to 4 hours from my other home in Thailand. I'll be…</p>
<p>Hello Chris,</p>
<p>Thanks for the feedback. I realize I can go even lower tech, but I've got to start somewhere. The tires should be easy to get, but I don't actually have any. The reason why I plan on using river gravel (roundish) is that the reservoir should be able to hold more water that way. I don't live at the site; it's sort of a great, big playground for me. In fact, it's a 12 hour drive from my home in Vientiane, Laos, and about 3 to 4 hours from my other home in Thailand. I'll be spending every other week there while I get the system up and running. I'm hoping that the worms and potatoes can go a full week without watering. I'll have local help to feed the fish and handle whatever else needs to be done in the aquaponic component, and I'll be there for the weekly harvest. So this is one less thing I'll have to have help with. I'm still convinced that tires are resistant to worm-escape as long as you don't fill them up to the rim until another tire is added. As for potatoes, I'll be growing semi-indeterminate varieties, from "TPS," True Potato Seeds. The trick is to keep building up to lengthen the underground stem and thereby improve potato yields. I'll have 3 potato plants in each stack of tires. I agree that mounding achieves the same result, but I'd need more area. The walls of the tires will keep the grow media in place. This, of course, is all theory with a lot of wishful thinking thrown in. . . <br/> <br/> <cite>Chris said:</cite></p>
<blockquote cite="http://community.theaquaponicsource.com/forum/topics/contemplating-wicking-beds?groupUrl=wicking-bed-growers&commentId=4778851%3AComment%3A362909&xg_source=msg_com_gr_forum#4778851Comment362909"><div><div class="xg_user_generated"><p>Well I really like your sketchup. It is a fun (and frustrating) tool to play around with. I agree with TC on the "lower tech" however. Is it that you have a bunch of tires accessible to you that you are using them? If you can get your hands on some food safe 55gallon/200liter barrels I would personally prefer those. You could use both ends for your wicking beds and the center ring for your worm bins or cut the barrel ends off and you can get 3 rings for worm bins out of them. For the wicking beds it should be straight forward to fill the bottoms with whatever material as TC said, and plumb the reservoir together. This is exactly what Chris Smith, this groups owner has. Check out this pics if you get a moment.</p>
<p>(<a rel="nofollow" href="http://community.theaquaponicsource.com/photo/2012-04-25-001-2012-04-25-015-2?context=user">http://community.theaquaponicsource.com/photo/2012-04-25-001-2012-0...</a>)</p>
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<p>Alternatively digging a trench and using the whole thing as a planting area is pretty straight forward and you don't have to worry about building wicks etc. But if you have tires already then of course use that.</p>
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<p>For the potato stacks, keep in mind just stacking more dirt is likely good enough. you don't have to build the container higher<img src="http://www.bkserv.net/images/Smile.gif"/></p>
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</blockquote> Well I really like your sketc…tag:aquaponicgardening.ning.com,2012-07-14:4778851:Comment:3629092012-07-14T15:06:17.967ZChris Carrhttps://aquaponicgardening.ning.com/profile/Chris954
<p>Well I really like your sketchup. It is a fun (and frustrating) tool to play around with. I agree with TC on the "lower tech" however. Is it that you have a bunch of tires accessible to you that you are using them? If you can get your hands on some food safe 55gallon/200liter barrels I would personally prefer those. You could use both ends for your wicking beds and the center ring for your worm bins or cut the barrel ends off and you can get 3 rings for worm bins out of them. For the wicking…</p>
<p>Well I really like your sketchup. It is a fun (and frustrating) tool to play around with. I agree with TC on the "lower tech" however. Is it that you have a bunch of tires accessible to you that you are using them? If you can get your hands on some food safe 55gallon/200liter barrels I would personally prefer those. You could use both ends for your wicking beds and the center ring for your worm bins or cut the barrel ends off and you can get 3 rings for worm bins out of them. For the wicking beds it should be straight forward to fill the bottoms with whatever material as TC said, and plumb the reservoir together. This is exactly what Chris Smith, this groups owner has. Check out this pics if you get a moment.</p>
<p>(<a href="http://community.theaquaponicsource.com/photo/2012-04-25-001-2012-04-25-015-2?context=user">http://community.theaquaponicsource.com/photo/2012-04-25-001-2012-04-25-015-2?context=user</a>)</p>
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<p>Alternatively digging a trench and using the whole thing as a planting area is pretty straight forward and you don't have to worry about building wicks etc. But if you have tires already then of course use that.</p>
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<p>For the potato stacks, keep in mind just stacking more dirt is likely good enough. you don't have to build the container higher :)</p> ya know Richard, you can prob…tag:aquaponicgardening.ning.com,2012-07-14:4778851:Comment:3625532012-07-14T02:02:28.477ZTCLynxhttps://aquaponicgardening.ning.com/profile/TCLynx
<p>ya know Richard, you can probably go even lower "tech" on the wicking beds if you want. I've done them as simple as a trench with some liner in the ground and then some coarse compostable materials like wood chips and sticks in the bottom and then I mound soil/compost on top. All the stuff like gravel and drainage pipe and geotextile is just extra. But if you have the stuff on hand go for it, I just want to let you know you don't "have to" go buying a bunch of extra stuff for a wicking…</p>
<p>ya know Richard, you can probably go even lower "tech" on the wicking beds if you want. I've done them as simple as a trench with some liner in the ground and then some coarse compostable materials like wood chips and sticks in the bottom and then I mound soil/compost on top. All the stuff like gravel and drainage pipe and geotextile is just extra. But if you have the stuff on hand go for it, I just want to let you know you don't "have to" go buying a bunch of extra stuff for a wicking bed.</p>
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<p></p> Yes, Chris, I was "mostly" je…tag:aquaponicgardening.ning.com,2012-07-14:4778851:Comment:3627132012-07-14T01:44:37.464ZRichard Monghttps://aquaponicgardening.ning.com/profile/RichardMong
<p>Yes, Chris, I was "mostly" jesting. TCLynx's points were very well made. Do you see any problems with the design? I'm thinking of a piece of perforated 4" pipe in the reservoir on center with the tires, stuffed with coir as the main wick. Do you think that is large enough? I'll be using standard automobile tires.</p>
<p>Yes, Chris, I was "mostly" jesting. TCLynx's points were very well made. Do you see any problems with the design? I'm thinking of a piece of perforated 4" pipe in the reservoir on center with the tires, stuffed with coir as the main wick. Do you think that is large enough? I'll be using standard automobile tires.</p>