Aquaponics For Beginners

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Coconut Husk for grow bed

by Keith C

Nov 14, 2013

Hi All,

I live on an island in the pacific region, materials are costly to ship and resources are few here.

I've searched the site on discussions about using coconut husk for a growing medium. The only discussions I've found were the use of coir (grounded husk). I'm unable to find any mention of husking the coconut, removing the fiber (inner husk) and cutting the outer/thicker portion of the husk into maybe 3/4 to 1/2 inch cubes or pieces. Rather than fill the grow bed with the husk. I was planning on placing the husked cubes into planter pots lined in the grow bed to minimize the breakdown of the material.

I have seen the use of moss that grows in our limestone jungles after being boiled and dried, but I'm looking for an alternative to hydroton of which we do not have and costly to ship. Our gravel / rock is limestone and have read would not work.

Any information would help. Thanks.

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  • up

    Chris Duke

    Check this out. I came across some posts on here about zip tubes, then looked it up on youtube for some video's. This may be the EZ answer to your media problems. Cheap, lightweight, etc. This guy would seem to be a big pioneer in this method considering all the video's he has going on the subject in youtube. I stayed up all night long last night watching them. I would imagine this product would be compressible to fit a lot of it into a container, or could be pre installed in the tubes, then tightly packed into a container for shipping. If I were to ever move to an island, this I think would be the system I would bring with me. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdNLE33fcMMW3uYINssFKBQ

    Also, I bet your coconut husks would work well in one of these vertical systems. Or what even about vertical  aeroponics?

    Nov 25, 2013

  • up

    Keith C

    Thanks for the link and thoughts for my situation. Their channel is quite informative. I'll have to keep an open mind and be more flexible. This is taking more thought before jumping to any one type of set up. So far, I'm moving towards Glenn Martinez' air lift set up and system, a neighbor of mine is also planning to include towers in his system...the coming months will tell what I'll end up with, again it depends what will ship out to our region or whatever I can modify or improvise to keep costs down. Thanks again for your input.

    Nov 26, 2013

  • up

    Damian Hinkson

    Hi Keith C, Hows it going i am a little late to reply to this but i live on an island to and i use coconut husk in my system it works well once you get roots taking over the growbed they help keep every thing together watch out the tannins from the husk will turn your water dark at first (this does not harm the fish). it takes about 10 galls of water to clean out 1 gal of husk. i use flood and drain my grow beds are 12in deep and a 5 foot Diameter circle. with a flow of 5 galls per min. Hopes this helps!!!! drop me a line on face book or google my farm Bairds village farms.

    May 4, 2015