My aquaponic adventures

Nice!!
Have you thought about doing a comparison test grow with clones? :grin::nerd_face:

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You mean between water and dirt? I’ve thought about it, but I quickly kill anything I’ve ever grown in dirt, so it wouldn’t be a great comparison :grin:.

I am building a sip bucket, so if that works out it’ll be the closest comparison I’ve been able to do.

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Lol!! Murder by thirst I’m guessing?
Sounds like I’ll have to try some sort of aquaponics. You know, even though goldfish aren’t people plate worthy, I’m pretty sure they’d make fine cat food. :grin:

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@HappyTrees23s has a solid germination technique I don’t want to lose :grin:

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Actually I screw up the other way, I always over water… No matter what I do, I always drown plant eventually 🤦.

I was asking in a thread here if anyone had tried those globe things for watering with weed, and that’s what eventually got me to a sip system. I’d still like to try a globe thing though, lol.

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Nice set up @luxton i am into hydro myself too but i never tried dwc. What i don’t understand is how overwatering on any medium is ever possible when growing on water is no obstacle. Can you explain me?

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You can start with a vey small, simple grow… Just a tank with a filter, drop a plant in, just keep the roots away from the fish… You’ll never look back, I didn’t :grin:.

I’m more than happy to throw design ideas around with ya too :metal::metal:

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I’ll explain it the way it was e planed to me (in other words, this might be complete shyte, but it makes logical sense :grin:).

In hydro grows, we’re injecting a ton of air into the water, so the plant roots can still breathe. When you soak soil, it sticks to the roots and doesn’t move, stopping them from being able to breathe.

He said he could prove it too, so I tried it and he was absolutely right.

Buy your partner, or yourself :grin::metal:, some cut flowers from the store. When you put them in a vase, drop in an air stone connected to a little aquarium air pump. He said if I did that, the flowers would last, on average, 2 weeks and look good, whereas without sir they’re dead in a week. So, pushing air into the water, at the bottom, is cleaning off the bottom of the stems and is oxygenating the water.

It works so well I still want to design a vase with an air pump built in, lol.

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Checking out the girls (:crossed_fingers:) today… They’re growing happily :grin:


xtreme haze


Oats x rolling Thunder #1


Oats x rolling Thunder #2

There’s definitely something going on with #2, she’s not currently a happy girl. I’ve seen this before, they shed a couple fan leaves the boom, they’re crazy happy and get back to growing like a… Lol, weed. Hopefully this will be the same. I don’t think there’s anything g wrong with the water or the other 2 plants would be having an issue as well.

:crossed_fingers:

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Million years later i see missed your reply 🫢
The heat has been less than cool to deal with. But i kept cutting holes in it till it sort of stayed in range of not quite cooking everything to death :skull:
No worries in winter (at least with the heat, i been strugglin in other areas lol)

That is funny yours started working! Free fridge yo :snowman_with_snow:

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Haha all good man, I’m still pokin around here :grin:

Lol, they heat up sooo fast, eh?? I ended up cutting a 2" hole in the fridge going into the freezer, then another going out from the freezer out. Then when that wasn’t enough, I had a computer fan pushing air out both… In the end, I had a towel stuck in the bottom so the door wouldn’t close all the way, lol. Thinking about it now, if I had another set of holes for air intake, it would have been more than enough 🤦😂.

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This one finally tipped the scales :balance_scale:

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Niiiiicely done

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The girls stretched a bit last night :grin:


Xtreme haze


Oatz x rolling Thunder #1


Oats x rolling Thunder #2

#2 still isn’t looking overly happy. I’m really digging the grow pots though, I took out 2 empty ones and spread out the 3 girls more evenly, and moved #2 closer to the water coming in, just in case it is nutrient difficient. Definitely needing more goldfish at the moment, but they’re getting more settled now and I up’d their food a bit, so they should produce more for me :grin::metal::crossed_fingers:

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I also picked up a new webcam today. I’m hoping my webcam app will be able to take better pics than this, lol

2024-02-22--14-05-08

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Xtreme haze


Oats x Rolling Thunder #1


Oats x Rolling Thunder #2

#2 is not looking super happy. The new leaves are looking great, but those old ones are yellowing right out.

I tripled the fish feeding schedule from 1 a day to 3. There’s nothing left over, so the fish are eating up all the food I’m putting in, which means more nutes coming soon.

I picked up a “brute” garbage can yesterday, I’m going to redo my system in pieces. I want to move the fish into the garbage can, that’ll keep their water at a constant level. I want an overflow out of the garage can, but pulling from the bottom middle of the can, so I can collect the poop out. That overflow will flow into the aquarium for now, to be replace with a couple of black bins, where I’ll have the 6 air stones and all my biomedia. I’m going to try and fit in my big canister aquarium filter, that will pull water out of the biofilter and push it back into the garbage can, at an angle to create circular flow in the can. I’ll use the same pump I’m using now to push water out to the grow beds, and those will return the water to the biofilter. Eventually, I want the biofilter in a couple black bins, and then another set of stacked bins where water can flow out of the biofilter and settle. The pump and the canister filter would pull water out of this tank. Essentially that will make the biofilter work hard on all solids, and it will also add a bunch of water to the system, making changes happen more slowly and keeping a balanced system a little easier.

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I was hanging out in the tent, changing out the webcam, the new one is sooo much better, but v1 of my app isn’t sizing the picture correctly so I’m missing at least half the image.

2024-02-23--15-39-51

I’m glad I upgraded this one.

I also got the manifold for the new layout done today. Coming out of the tank on the ground, it will go up to 4 different valves. 2 go out to the grow beds (I’m adding another), 1 will go to the germ/seedling area at the top front and the last will go to the mom area at the bottom front. There’s space to add another valve if I want a third grow bed over top of the garbage can. I need to shave down some plywood to fit between the tent poles, then strap that into place, attach the manifold and I can get to plumbing the rest of it. The more I watching the water free flow, the more I’m thinking I’d rather a 1/2" piece ran down the inside of the bed with 1/4" line coming up to each pot… Top down constant watering. I’m just worried about solids from the fish tank clogging the 1/4" line. If this works this way I’m hoping it does, I’ll be using the same 1/4" line for the front of the tent too. Ideally, the moms are in sip buckets, all connected in series and I’ll just be able to turn on the valve to fill up the reservoirs. I’m just not sure how to return the overflow water to the system yet.

To give you an idea of smooth… I just took a small branch, leaves still on, striped the stick and dumped everything into a coffee grinder. 2 joints later, I… Am… Baked, which is rare these days, and not a single cough. I forgot the dried leaves were even in there until I finished the second one :grin::metal:

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I still have to check out this guys system more, but damn!!

looks like everything is progressing well in here!

glad to hear you’re enjoying the fruits of your labor. hopefully the security precautions have been effective. just don’t get too stoned to remember them :upside_down_face:

your plants look like they’re chugging along but i do see some issues as well. both of the oatz f1s seem to be having issues. #1 seems stunted. it looks like it’s wanting more oxygen in the roots to me. the color of it seems good so i would say ph and nutrition might be ‘slightly’ off but that doesn’t seem entirely it. the nice green color to me says they’re fine they just need more time to develop. i wouldn’t worry about some leaves decaying and falling off as long as you’re noticing new growth daily. it’s when growth halts you know you have issues that need immediate remedy otherwise :skull:

your new setup sounds interesting! will be enjoyable to see it up and running! i’m not sure i understand the layout otherwise i would comment more. i understand a lot by being able to see something :eyes:

one way you’ll know if it’s an oxygen thing in the root zone… take them out for a couple hours. if they perk up without water you’ll know.

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