Maintenance

Spent the morning doing repairs to my raft system.  I built it on an old set of hydroponic frames. So it seems a good idea at the time. However the additional weigh of the raft system has resulted in the frames sinking into the ground. The local soil is a very light clay.  Hard as rock and dusty when dry and slippery mud when wet. So any slight moisture and the system collapsed... Bummer.

Still today we  redid the frame supports and added some angle iron to sides and undersides of the  polystyrene raft.  Should be good to go. Unfortunately we lot our stock of plants which as it happens were doing abysmally...

So time to move on. Next crop.  We'll keep recirculating to keep the fish happy.  Should commence reseeding tomorrow.

I'll reset everything back in its rightful place tomorrow and also sort out the seedling table and tidy up the area.  It has all been a bit full on recently and a very hectic time. Finishing the house, Work prospects etc so this has not received priority. Cold beer this evening and start again tomorrow.

Small upgrade to tidy the place up.

Decided to concrete some of the surrounding area to the tanks and seedling area. Definetely required before the rainy season.  The dusty soil just turns to mud.  Horrible to walk on.  I'll also be doing a pathway between the runs in due course. Thats definately for another day.

Concreting scheduled for later today but maybe delayed till tomorrow.  Depends on having suffucient aggregate. Easy to buy but been busy fixing a water leak... Another story altogether.

General Update 1000 litre system

Been a hectic last two weeks. Busy on house, driving new motorbike etc so Aquaponics has not been taking the No 1 spot.  This last two weeks we've lots about 5 fish. The system is not overloaded but I think they were being slowly killed by love. i.e. to much food. So a couple of days off should do the trick.  I've done some water tests nothing major to report. Reading up the general consensus is the system needs 4-6 months to stabilise. So 6 weeks in is not to bad.

We've added in our NFT table which started yesterday. To early to say if it will work. For salads I expect it to be fine but for tomatoes doubt there is a high enough concentration of nutrients to really get it all moving in the right direction.

The first two photos show our new tables NFT and the third the inside of the tunnel with the deep water and polystyrene floats.

Pictures tell a thousand words...

New System Part 7

Just added a couple of 500 gram Tilipia as the bio level based on using my Hyrdoponic trunchon read 8.3 (initial system is reading around 14 and seems OK with the plants looking a little weak.) so I need more nutrients in the system to maintain my plants. Hopefully these two big fish should add something to all this. The fish actually were caught in our pond a few days ago. We left them in our other system until we were ready for a Bar B Q. Guess they got a reprieve....

New System Part 6

Things are going well. Did some water testing and things look good.  We did have some trouble getting the tanks to stop leaking.  I have been unable to locate a shop that sells rubber grummets. Bit of a problem. But for now plasticine seems to work. The leaking makes the ground soft and then the tanks tilt more. Sort of self perpetuating....
But all good. Next job is to add in some NFT pipes to see if I can these going as well. (added a picture of it half done). Only doubt I am having is if the fish are producing enough nutrients to feed so many plants. The system is new so does need some time to get established. I've got a EC meter for measuring the amount of nutriens in the water and will start using it this week. Interest all the stuff I'll saved over the years from my earlier hydroponic farming as it is all coming back into use. Feels good not to have so much waste and also gets rid of a lot of crap in my store!!!

One thing I have not figured out yet is why the polystyrene trays have a series of channels and then a sheet that side on top with holes. Well I know if for irrigation but my question is why 10 run channels in the base polystyrene and 6 rows of holes. Means some of the plants have to struggle a bit to get down to the water flow. I've not [put this to clearly but it is difficult to explain. Anyway all going OK for now.

New System Part 5

We've doing well. Everything installed except the spreader bar to deliver water to the plants. Just need ot cut some holes and install it. Spend this morning installing some building blocks (red clay bricks) as part of my bio filter. So spreader bar, add bio filter material and some filter cloth good to go.  Seedlings are ready.  Fish shop will have our fish ready on Friday... All done and sorted !!!

All Going Well.

Not much to record at this time. System seems ot be going OK. Few small insects and a sort of white fly around but to be expected with no covers. Took a few photos. All growing well.