This past week when it was 115°+ for two days, was too much for one of my poor chickens.   The other 3 seem to be doing quite well though.   The fish in the aquaponics pond are really growing.  Some are close to 3″ now, nearly 3x the size of what they were when I first got them.

My neighbor gave me this great old lantern and ironworks which I hung in my yard.

The hidden cucumber

The pepper plants are taking off too now!

Swiss Chard

Tomatoes

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Have a look at the plants — the tomatoes, squash, and cucumber plants are running everywhere.  In the back you can see my lettuce has gotten so big, it is going to seed.  In the middle of the growth is a cilantro plant which also has gone to seed.   I’m interested to see if anything will sprout on its own.

Heirloom Tomatoes

Cherry Tomatoes

Cucumbers

Swiss Chard

Lettuce Going to Seed

Vines Going Everywhere

So far, I’ve only eaten lettuce and strawberries from the garden.  Soon, I expect we will have lots of tomatoes, squash and cucumbers though.  I’m looking forward to the summer harvest.

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I was lucky to have  a friend who helped with the landscape design and more so, the labor!

This is what it looks like now that it is all done

The fish have been in the tank for 2 days now.

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I’ve been cycling my system for 10 days more than what is on the chart below.  I’ve been surprised that it never really cycled — no real rise in Nitrite and Nitrate never increased at all.

Here is what it looked like when I opened the shipping box.

It’s hard to tell, but there are 50 or more in that bag.  They are about 1″ long right now.

Here is a clearer shot once I removed the outer bag.

Floating the bag in the aquaponics tank

Have a look at how the heirloom tomatoes and lettuce are doing.

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Have a look at how the aquaponics garden is doing 3 weeks after I had to remove all the plants and empty it.   All but 2 Armenian cucumber plants made it, and those two were always in trouble.   I picked up another cucumber plant this morning which I hope will do much better.

Fish are on order.  I expect they will arrive next Thursday.  I can’t wait to see how things change once the fish are in the system.
All that is left is to add the rock which will give a finished look to the ground.   I plan on putting in a redish/brown crushed granite.

Couldn’t pass a shot of the girls waiting by the door of the run.

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Here you can get an idea of the lighting I put in for a little night time ambiance.

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You can see how dirty the rock was.

I spent several days washing rock like this.

I finally got all the rock done and back in the planter.  Once I got the cycling working, the plants were moved back in.  I hope they do ok.  They were definitely stressed.  Most of the plants were wilted.   I also got a different liquid seaweed.  This one seemed much better.  It really smells like the ocean and seaweed.

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By the time the weekend came around, there was nothing to do but empty the garden bed and drain the pond.   So, that’s what I did.  I searched all over for the leak, but found none.  The ground under the liner was also only the slightest bit damp.   This left me thinking that the water was spilling over the side when full and under the full weight forcing the one corner down.

Since it is apart, I took the opportunity to clean things up.  I put in footer blocks to support the pond and garden.  I also modified some of my electrical to make servicing in the future easier.  The last thing I’m going to do is screen my rock and try and clean it up.

I currently have my plants in a kiddie pool I picked up down the street.  I loaded a bunch of the rock and water from the garden into it this weekend.   The rest of the rock as you can see is piled up where ever there was space.

2.5 Tons of rock moved with a 5 gallon bucket

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This weekend I had a lot to do.  I started off by going to the nursery and buying plants for the backyard.   Once I got the plants home, I shifted focus and spent the next few hours working on my truck – resealing the intake manifold because of a water leak.   By 3:00 in the afternoon, it was time to get back to the yard and get my plants in the ground.

In this small corner area just off of the aquaponics garden you can see Aloe Vera, Mint Saucer tucked under the far rock, some Yellow Iris by the rocks, Purple Lantana, and some Yellow Carolina Jasmine and Orange Honeysuckle against the walls.   I plan to add trellis’ later and have the Jasmine and Honeysuckle  cover the wall.   I also ran wiring for lighting — you can see the loops left behind two of the rocks.    In the center of the photo is my apricot tree.    Next to the  posts of the aquaponics garden I placed creeping fig which I will train up the post over time.

In the photo below, I added English Ivy to the corner of the chicken coop.  Over time, I will train this up the side of the coop.

One last Carolina Jasmine on the far end of the coop which will also get a trellis soon.

Soon the water in my aquaponics will have cycled and it will be time to add my fish.   I figure about that same time, I will finish my landscaping off with the crushed granite/DG to add the red crushed rock look to the ground and give it that clean finished look.

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