A Community and Forum For Aquaponic Gardeners

September 2010 Blog Posts (33)

Relationship (concealing) counseling through Aquaponics

We all know who they are. Our Significant others, wives, husbands, lovers, family or even just friends.… Continue

Added by M Cosmo on September 30, 2010 at 12:47pm — 4 Comments

Aquaponics in Japan

I am living in Japan and started with Aquaponics.Tryed to find members of AP but it seems there is nobody.Dos anybody knows AP members in Japan?
Please contact me.
your lonesome AP fan Alfred

Added by alfred leslie goeltinger on September 29, 2010 at 7:44pm — 2 Comments

The $600 head of Lettuce - The green drug dealers guide to sanity.

Caution ... Don't let your significant other read this post.

Refer to my next post - Relationship therapy through Aquaponics.

Ok we all know that there are hidden costs when getting involved in Aquaponics. I have written in the past about how my reuse - recycle greenhouse cost me in the thousands already. I know many of us like to scavenge - salvage - recycle etc. many of our materials. So here is my quest to lettuce nirvana.

I bought into…

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Added by M Cosmo on September 28, 2010 at 6:46pm — 12 Comments

In which we may start a business... or two

One of the challenges of building your own system (or components) out of food-grade containers is finding said containers at a reasonable price somewhat locally. I've been searching / researching for several months now with limited success, but then again I haven't been trying all that hard because it was still just preliminary research. But now that I have a system coming, and it'll need a sump tank immediately and some additional grow beds soon, I got a little more… Continue

Added by Andrea on September 28, 2010 at 9:30am — No Comments

Indexing Valves, Sequential flooding of grow beds.

Aquaponics Indexing valves.

They are a means to sequentially flood grow beds.

They are purely passive mechanical devices. Only plumbing connected to them.

The flow of water operates the indexing valve. When the flow starts, the valve engages to feed…

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Added by TCLynx on September 25, 2010 at 9:30pm — 1 Comment

Solenoid Valves

I want to make everyone aware that those inexpensive solenoid valves like used for irrigation are not necessarily the simple way to control water flow to grow beds.

See those solenoid valve require a certain amount of water pressure to operate properly. If there isn't enough pressure behind them, they may not open to let water flow through at all. Very few aquaponics systems are likely to run pumps at high enough pressure to effectively operate these valves.

For example: many… Continue

Added by TCLynx on September 25, 2010 at 8:43pm — No Comments

Gonna Have Bananas, Gonna Have Bananas, Nah nah nah nah naah.

Sorry, couldn't help it.

Anyway, yesterday there was a big chunk of plant matter laying on the grow bed right by the front porch and the cook said, ya know what that is? Part of a Banana Flower.

Now this banana was a fairly small transplant when placed in this grow bed this past spring.…

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Added by TCLynx on September 24, 2010 at 4:29pm — No Comments

Maybe it won't be that difficult after all

My boss has our old trailer and he's offered to loan it to me. My exhusband has a Honda Element that is already set up to tow that trailer, and he said I could borrow it if he has time to fix the broken motor mount. My local fish guru said it was really important to keep the water level in the transport barrel less than halfway, and that means it will weigh less than 200 lbs instead of the expected 400. If I'm using the trailer and the Element, I *will* be able to use the cigarette lighter, so… Continue

Added by Andrea on September 24, 2010 at 9:30am — 1 Comment

DECISION EVEN TOUGHER

I thought my aquaponics decision would be limited to which system to use, the ebb and flow, DWC, or a combination of both. If it were to be on a small scale, the decision would be fairly easy when I got to that point. But what happens when you have a costly asset already in place that could be used to grow koi? In this case it is a swimming pool on property I own that my wife and I want to move back to. It is approximately 27 feet x 14 feet, with the deepest part at 7 ft. and the shallowest…

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Added by Gus Cabrera on September 23, 2010 at 3:30pm — 11 Comments

Gravel washing

Well, after I filled the second half of pots with the expanded shale and coco ocir (the other half is with chunky perlite and coco coir) I just read a post that reminded me that I didn't wash any of it!! How important is this??

Added by Michelle Silva on September 23, 2010 at 11:33am — 8 Comments

OMGOMGOMG! A real system - for FREE!

So today a member of one of the AP message boards posted that he was going to be getting rid of his system. It's complete - heck, it's up and running with fish and plants - but would anyone like to come pick it up?

I checked to make sure his phone number was in an area code I recognized before I called.

It's a 340 gallon fishtank, an 8'l x 2'w x 12"d raft trough, some 1" - 4" tilapia, and all the plumbing and pumps and everything. I hadn't been planning a raft system to… Continue

Added by Andrea on September 23, 2010 at 9:30am — No Comments

Herding Chickens

Now I've learned that herding most of my ducks is actually pretty easy (except for a moma duck trying to get back to her eggs, that is a whole other challenge) herding the ducks usually just takes a little patients and a long stick, walk slowly tword them so they will walk away from you in the direction you want. Don't walk too fast or they may panic and bolt around you instead of moving away in the direction you want. Use long stick, or net or mop, whatever to extend your reach wider so they… Continue

Added by TCLynx on September 22, 2010 at 6:12pm — No Comments

Further away from Neutral pH monitoring

pH is a very important part of aquaponics so here is another blog post about it.

My first two years I was running systems that was full of shells as media, that system really didn't need much pH monitoring at all (or at least hasn't over the 2 years.) I've never seen the pH get down to 7.0 and the only things that cause it to get over 8 are a major algae bloom and a giant water change with well water. That lulled me into a false sense of security about pH.

Now I have my 300… Continue

Added by TCLynx on September 22, 2010 at 10:17am — No Comments

How the HECK! Did that fish manage to get on top of the tank cover?

I went outside this morning and was on my way to an appointment so didn't have any extra time but I went to peak at the fish like I often do

?There was a 11 inch catfish laying on top!!!! of the tank cover???

There is a little gap off to one side near the feeder but to have gotten up onto the cover by the feeder then some how get on top of the higher bit of cover over the center of the tank was… Continue

Added by TCLynx on September 21, 2010 at 11:15am — 4 Comments

September 20, 2010

Yesterday I started a bunch of trays of seeds. The trays I'm using hold 42 small peat pellets (7 rows of 6)

Anyway, I made a point of planting one tray in such a manner that I can do another tray the same (I often do each row as a type of seeds since I'm not likely to need 42 of any one thing all at once, I'm not commercial.) So since yesterday was ranked as a good day for planting above ground crops and today is a poor day for planting according to the almanac, I'm doing a… Continue

Added by TCLynx on September 20, 2010 at 6:23pm — No Comments

AP Workshop

General

Saturday I attended the Aquaponics workshop in Oceanside. It was Murray Hallam's first US workshop. It was a very informal event, and the 25 or so of us interrupted constantly with questions, comments, and shared experiences. Though as Murray said, AP is simple enough that there just isn't 8 hours of information for him to share anyway. So our questions helped fill in the time profitably. It was great to be able to ask… Continue

Added by Andrea on September 20, 2010 at 9:30am — No Comments

September 19, 2010

Just so you all know, I use the

Gardening by the Moon Calendar from the Farmers' Almanac http://www.farmersalmanac.com/calendar/gardening/

I can't say as I've done any good side by side comparisons to know if it really works but I use it. There have been some times when I didn't check and just planted stuff because it was the only time I had and some of those times it seems very little came up. If it was due… Continue

Added by TCLynx on September 19, 2010 at 6:47pm — 2 Comments

What do Children and Gurus have in common? Lessons learned in the Man Cave.

Thoughts that came to me in my greenhouse - the outside man cave

What do Children and Gurus have in common?…

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Added by M Cosmo on September 19, 2010 at 3:00pm — 4 Comments

September 18, 2010

Not so much about Aquaponics, but more of just a Garden Journal post.

Planting Peas today. Snow peas, 1/2 lb packs of two different varieties from Johnny's Selected Seeds

Snow Sweet I planted on the East side of the South section of trellis and on the West side of the North Section of trellis along the middle of my side yard along the line of crepe myrtles.

Oregon Giant I planted on the West side of the South section (seeded very heavily I might add) and more normal seeding… Continue

Added by TCLynx on September 18, 2010 at 3:23pm — 10 Comments

Keep a spare on hand

Just to reassure all that everything is fine before I even tell the story (though it isn't very dramatic that way, it isn't that dramatic a story anyway.)

Anyway,

It was labor day weekend and I was about to go out of town for 9 days and I noticed that the air volume coming from the air pump seemed to be far less than normal. Well dang, it's a holiday weekend and I can't get the replacement diaphragm kit for my pump before I leave. I'll just have to hope and pray there isn't a… Continue

Added by TCLynx on September 16, 2010 at 1:41pm — No Comments