What size of gravel is the best?

[Victor O. Penna]

 

[Victor O. Penna]

I have been using on my flood bed small gravel for about two years and at the beginning it just worked perfect, but recently the water has trouble passing through. I can do a good cleaning and bring it back but according to Murray Hallam there should be a medium size gravel in order not to clog the system. Can someone tell me what is the size or type and those it really makes a difference?
Also, what type of worm is use for the gravel? Is it common hearth worms?

[Daniel E Murphy]

IMHO - Pea pebble for small plants and river rock for larger ones. If we are talking gravel

[TCLynx]

Gravel. Well the 1/2" brown or white river rock commonly available around Florida works well (just make sure it is quartz type of river gravel since limestone and marble would not be good.) However, even larger like a size range that varies between 3/8" and 3/4" would have even less problems with clogging but the larger river rock in the 3/4" size seems to be harder to find and the 1/2" river rock seems a fairly common screen size.

I just used some of my composting worms from my worm farm. Red worms or Red wrigglers are common names of composting worms here in Florida.

[Harrison Wayne Griffith]

hi all. I am very new in this and am trying to learn all I can before I get into it and kill my fish. So I see you say to use quartz type gravel. Ok I am a dumb how do I tell what kind of gravel I have. Thank you Harrison

[Daniel E Murphy]

Quartz is generally translucent and mostly yellow and brown in color. If it looks powdery white then don't use it as it may be limestone.


Harrison Wayne Griffith said:

hi all. I am very new in this and am trying to learn all I can before I get into it and kill my fish. So I see you say to use quartz type gravel. Ok I am a dumb how do I tell what kind of gravel I have. Thank you Harrison

[TCLynx]

You can test to see if something is going to react and raise you pH by pouring some vinegar in a container to cover some of the gravel. If it fizzes up big time, then there is probably a lot of calcium carbonate and it will keep your pH too high if you use it as your growbed media.

[Victor O. Penna]

Thank you for the replies.
I just finished watching Murray Hallam’s video and he recommends ¾ stones not smaller.
My other question was about worms. Murray Hallam’s video talks about using worms as the aquaponics secret. Does anyone use worms? And where can you buy them in Florida?
Thanks

[TCLynx]

Yep have worms.
I got composting worms for a worm farm from these guys. (They are local for me)
Worms

[Victor O. Penna]

Do you use them in your aquaculture or just in your composting?
Thanks for the webpage.

[Daniel E Murphy]

Nice :) Thanks for that tip!


TCLynx said:

You can test to see if something is going to react and raise you pH by pouring some vinegar in a container to cover some of the gravel. If it fizzes up big time, then there is probably a lot of calcium carbonate and it will keep your pH too high if you use it as your growbed media.

[TCLynx]

I got a 2 lb package of them a few years back and I used a few hand fulls of the worms from my worm bin in the system when I started my firs system up.
So I'm using them for both.

Victor O. Penna said:

Do you use them in your aquaculture or just in your composting?
Thanks for the webpage.

[Ross Cayson]

Could anyone tell me if crushed rock aggregate Called blue metal "3/4 would be a safe rock to use in my aquaponics system????