Tomatoes bed size

[Fred Gill]

Hi,

Trying to find the best spacing for Tomatoes in a grow bed. Has anyone used say 12" x 12" x 30' bed? Trying to grow in a row with the ability to roll a cart between the rows. Is there a maximum length that one can go?

Fred

[Chris Downs]

How big are your tanks, and will you be producing enough nutrients for your plants? 

Where do you flow the influent to?  The center, or an end or in multiple inlets?  Chemistry says that as long as you have the proper chemistry, as well as proper Ph, Temp, Minerals, as well as are willing to experiment and test, you can make adjustments to make it work, or re-think your system.

Also,  What type of tomatoes are you growing, as well as how will you support the vines as they grow?

Sorry, a lot more questions than answers, but you do need to choose and plan your grow bed.

Hope this little push helps.  We keep our tomato plants 14" apart, and tie them up as they grow.

[Joe Bifano]

I did a 12" x 12" x 10' bed and used it like a raft but with cinders and it fed another 12" x 12" x 10' bed. The tomatoes in the front got all the nutrients and the plants at the end suffered a lot. I fed the bed like you would a raft so next spring I will adjust the input so it is more even to all the plants and I think it will work great. My tomatoes started out 2 to 3 months late and I still got 12' high plants and a unreal amount of fruit. So spreading out the nutrients will be the answer. I have never used it as a siphon type bed so I am not sure what will happen that way.

[RupertofOZ]

Not sure why you were having "nutrient" problems Joe..

 

Here are 300mm x 1mtr x 2mtr beds... that's approx... 12" x 39" x 79" beds... growing tomatoes, and other things... just fine...

 

 

 

 

[RupertofOZ]

And here's a trough... 12" x 12" x 7'....  growing a crop of determinent tomatoes.. and silver beet...

[Joe Bifano]

Rupert, In these beds are you using ebb & flow?

I was using just flow like a raft, in on one end and out at the other, so the beds never drained and thought that must be why I was having trouble. The plants on the end were deficient in phosphorous, the leaves turned dark almost purple. They eventually died.

[Chris Carr]

Joe. Maybe your issues where getting proper water circulation around the roots of the further away plants with issues. It could be that the water flow of the constant flood happened to find a shortcut to your drain. Stale moving water is enough to keep it alive for the most part, but not enough to really give it what it needs. The moving water itself should have constant concentrations of nutrient everywhere in the system if its circulating at a reasonable rate. DO may be another story though.

[Joe Bifano]

You are correct in that I am sure the water found a short cut to the drain. I will change these to ebb and flow then before next spring.

[Fred Gill]

Chris,

I used AP Solutions Calculator for the tank size (http://www.aquaponic.com.au/backyard.htm) but the fellow wasn't much help after I had questions using his calculator.

I have not yet started using my system and hope to by the end of the month. I have 8.4 m2 or 90.4 sq ft grow beds. This calcualtor tells me I need 40 kgs or 88 lbs of Tilapia in 900 gal. tank. I question this ratio for a relatively small grow bed.

Do you know a max tank size for grow bed relationship, with fish density? The calcualtor tells me to flood the bed once an hour. Is this enough or can you flood it 3-5 times and hour?

I have both heirloom  and determinate type tomatoes, again haven't planted them yet. When I get this system goingt I want to try a small comeercial setup hence my questions as to a 12" x 12" x 30' grow bed.

The nutirent infeed will be in 5' increment to avoid uneven plant growth. I see below where Rupert appears to have some nice plants a lot closer then 14".

Regards,

Fred

[Fred Gill]

Rupert,

Nice looking tomatoes!

What is your tank size vs. sq ft and fish density? With how many gallons do you flood your system p/hour and cycle how many times p/hour?

RupertofOZ said:

Not sure why you were having "nutrient" problems Joe..

 

Here are 300mm x 1mtr x 2mtr beds... that's approx... 12" x 39" x 79" beds... growing tomatoes, and other things... just fine...

 

 

 

 

[Chris Carr]

Rupert's vines planted like that are pretty badass.

If anything question the advice you get from others here, but that calculator in particular is a pretty reliable tool :)

1lb of fish to 1sqft of media for filtration is a pretty standard rule of thumb to be "safe" for backyard AP and generally avoid issues with not enough filtration. 100, 1 lb fish per IBC tote (~400gallon) is about right, so if you had 88kg then 2 totes worth, or 900gallon also sounds right.  

Circulating the water once and hour is the sweet spot. Anymore and you are wasting energy at best. Not sure if there would be other negative side effects to it. It would depend i guess. For a 30foot long bed, having multiple water inlet and multiple water outlet points is a very good idea. It likely wont flood and drain properly otherwise. 

Fred Gill said:

Chris,

I used AP Solutions Calculator for the tank size (http://www.aquaponic.com.au/backyard.htm) but the fellow wasn't much help after I had questions using his calculator.

I have not yet started using my system and hope to by the end of the month. I have 8.4 m2 or 90.4 sq ft grow beds. This calcualtor tells me I need 40 kgs or 88 lbs of Tilapia in 900 gal. tank. I question this ratio for a relatively small grow bed.

Do you know a max tank size for grow bed relationship, with fish density? The calcualtor tells me to flood the bed once an hour. Is this enough or can you flood it 3-5 times and hour?

[Vlad Jovanovic]

Knowing Rupert he probably figured out a way to grow all that using just a couple minnows :) Nice...

Chris, I thought IBC's come in 275 and 330 gallon sizes? But even sticking 100 1lb fish in a 400 gallon tank seems pretty damned tight...in which case it would probably be good to turn the water over more than once per hour...and have lots and lots of O2. Again 4 gallons per pound seems a bit dense (IMO) for us non-aquaculture expert types. 6-7 per lb might be more realistic? Less stressful for the operator as well as the fish...

1lb for a 12"x12"x12" deep (grow bed volume) is probably a maximum sort of number...

[Chris Carr]

Brain fart. I am a terrible multitasker. I somehow averaged 300 and rounded it to 400 in my head :) 

Vlad Jovanovic said:

Chris, I thought IBC's come in 275 and 330 gallon sizes?