Advanced aquaponics

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Water consumption in a fruiting crop system

by Kobus Jooste

Mar 22, 2011

I have never searched home system references for water loss ratios, but if I remember correctly, UVI data suggested a daily loss of around 1 - 2% of your total volume per day.  I have been operating pretty comfortably even in the drought, but as my bigger plants are maturing, I have seen a dramitic increase in water use.  It got so that I started looking for leaks in the system.  I have a huge passion fruit vine, amongst others, and I think that my focus on fruiting crops is elevating my water use - now closer to 4 - 5% of water volume per day.

 

Any one out there with thoughts on the topic?

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  • up

    TCLynx

    Yes, it is not just the "gravel" causing evaporation but the larger longer growing fruiting plants can really suck up some water and transpire it into the air in an attempt to make the environment more to their liking.  A big tomato plant and use up a huge amount of water.

    Apr 11, 2011

  • up

    Averan

    which brings me back to the thought of building a cold frame greenhouse over my beds....

    Apr 11, 2011

  • up

    Jay Wolf

    In my limited experience with our older systems, we lost 10% of our volume a day.  We were using trickling biofilters at the time so I thought that had something to do with the high loss (or low.....) of water volume.  The current system I am using now is losing 4% a day with mature plants throughout.  That is up from 2% just 3 months ago.  Great discussion and topic.  I would assume that the longer we hold our plants, the more water loss we should expect.

    Apr 11, 2011