There are lots of tomatoes on the vines, but something is eating them before they ripen. I haven’t found a worm yet, but something is out there. The vines were everywhere, so yesterday I hung some fencing as a trellis and tied the tomato plants and cucumbers to them. I found a large cucumber already which was totally hidden before I began moving everything around. 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 … [CLICK TO READ MORE]
Tag Archives: tilapia
Just a quick post showing the growth in the aquaponics garden since the fish were added. Things took off quickly once the water cycled and the fish began to grow. The fingerlings are now a little over 2″ in size, roughly double what they were when I first received them. 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, … [CLICK TO READ MORE]
It was one year ago when I began a new project. I was going to build a chicken coop and start a little back yard flock. The endeavor quickly grew to much more than just a coop, adding an aquaponics garden and ultimately, re-landscaping the entire back yard. I really got sucked in by those backyard chickens. 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. … [CLICK TO READ MORE]
Our system has been cycling with seaweed extract for the past few weeks. Over that time, the pH has come down to 7 which is good. Today the fish arrived. I was surprised to find the pH for the bag water at 7.8. Over the day, I gradually added tank water to the bag, slowly matching the pH. 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 … [CLICK TO READ MORE]
With the aquaponics garden back together and most of the yard cleaned up, I let the chickens out to roam around on another beautiful spring day. Here you can get an idea of the lighting I put in for a little night time ambiance. … [CLICK TO READ MORE]
Since I had to empty out the garden bed, I took advantage of the opportunity and washed all the rock. Washing rock one or two buckets at a time was a terribly long process. I cleaned two and a half tons of rock on my patio table like this. Each table load was about one and a half buckets of rock. 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. … [CLICK TO READ MORE]
Last week we took a little trip to LA. When we left, it was raining quite hard, but I thought nothing of it. When we got back I noticed the block supporting one of the legs under the garden bed had cracked. Each day, the block was more and more depressed in the earth. Over the week, I also noticed water loss and the ground on the side where the depression was located was wet. I thought, where’s the water going? I must have a hole in the pond liner and that the ground was made soft by it, thus allowing the bed to sink. 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 … [CLICK TO READ MORE]
It’s been so long, I can’t remember the last time I posted. I took some time off from my project over the holidays, and have just begun to get back in the swing again. This month, I began testing my tank and grow bed by filling them with water and cycling the system to insure the bell siphon would work properly. I’ve now got it set where it takes about 35 minutes to fill the grow bed, then 10 minutes to drain. This picture is of my first siphon setup. I’ve since changed my bell from 2″ to 3″. With a 3″ bell, I no longer needed the cap on the filter, as the bell fills the 4″ filter completely, not allowing any media to enter. I also added a 2″ to 1″ reducer on my stand pipe which greatly improved the starting and stopping of the siphon. Unfortunately I … [CLICK TO READ MORE]
I’ve been able to complete all electrical and plumbing for my aquaponics garden. This week the pump arrived. I ordered a Lifegard Quiet One 4000 pump rated a ~900GPH. Along with this main pump, I installed an emergency backup pump. This is nothing more than a bilge pump which is used just to aerate and circulate the water in the pond in the event of a power outage. It will run off of a 12 deep cycle battery. To make this work, I wired in a 12v relay which is powered by a “wall wart” plug/transformer I had stored in the attic from some long lost device. I found a deal on five of these relays with the pig tail plugs for $4.99 on Amazon. This is how my electrical and plumbing … [CLICK TO READ MORE]
It’s that time of year here in the Vegas valley where we have 2 or 3 weeks of wonderful weather. Time to enjoy to outdoors. I’ve spent the spring and summer working at a painfully slow pace on my coop and garden project. Seven months into it, I’ve finally finish the wood working part of my project. The coop and aquaponics pond and garden bed are built along with the patio cover. You can see the pond cover/bench seat now completed and in place above. I’ve also put grass back in the small area by my planter. The chickens have loved the addition. When I first put the grass in, I wondered what I was going to do about keeping it cut since I had given away our lawn mower. This turned out to not be a problem. The 4 chickens have kept the grass perfectly manicured. I let … [CLICK TO READ MORE]
