who gardens the aquaponics way?

[veggiechicken]

Waste what?

[zazen999]

I wonder what aquatic shops do with their waste?...........

We will never know.

[Bigmallly]

Waste what?

Well from what I can gather, the veg bed is a big filtration system. Dirty water is pumped from the fish tank into the bed, it is then filtered and clean water is put back into the tank. So my theory is that the fish waste must be food for the plants. I could be wrong, it has been known.........

[veggiechicken]

Thought you meant dead fish - sorry! I can be wrong too......

[Matt94]

zazen have you done sometyhing with her account? just wondering cos ive tried to look at the about me section on her account but cant seem to access it!

[Bigmallly]

zazen have you done sometyhing with her account? just wondering cos ive tried to look at the about me section on her account but cant seem to access it!

Zaz has got a big zapper stick thing which she gets out every now and again.........so I hear.....

[kingkano]

Well from what I can gather, the veg bed is a big filtration system. Dirty water is pumped from the fish tank into the bed, it is then filtered and clean water is put back into the tank. So my theory is that the fish waste must be food for the plants. I could be wrong, it has been known.........

Fish create ammonia as their waste product. Standard fish tank filtration uses the nitrogen cycle and bacteria to convert ammonia to nitrite, then to nitrate. Normally fish keepers need to remove the end product - nitrate - from the system via large water changes.

But nitrate is a fantastic plant food. From what I understand, aquaponics then takes water from the fish tank rich in nitrate and pumps it over gravel beds or some such, where the plant roots are, they absorb the nitrate and your fish tank gets nice clean water back. Thereby saving the fishkeeper work and the gardener can get yields from it.

It seems to be a new thing but the theory behind it is sound (I'm coming from a fishkeeping background with that comment). I have been trying to read more to see if its really a viable idea for smaller scale or if its just for the big boys.

[Bigmallly]

Fish create ammonia as their waste product. Standard fish tank filtration uses the nitrogen cycle and bacteria to convert ammonia to nitrite, then to nitrate. Normally fish keepers need to remove the end product - nitrate - from the system via large water changes.

But nitrate is a fantastic plant food. From what I understand, aquaponics then takes water from the fish tank rich in nitrate and pumps it over gravel beds or some such, where the plant roots are, they absorb the nitrate and your fish tank gets nice clean water back. Thereby saving the fishkeeper work and the gardener can get yields from it.

It seems to be a new thing but the theory behind it is sound (I'm coming from a fishkeeping background with that comment). I have been trying to read more to see if its really a viable idea for smaller scale or if its just for the big boys.

It wasn't a bad guess then was it?............

[growerkari]

I have lots of fishtanks and must admit, the old water goes straight down the drain, best start bottling the stuff then. Can you use salt water on the veg too? The nitrates in my Reef are always creeping up, so I do lots of water changes to keep them down

[kingkano]

I have lots of fishtanks and must admit, the old water goes straight down the drain, best start bottling the stuff then. Can you use salt water on the veg too? The nitrates in my Reef are always creeping up, so I do lots of water changes to keep them down

You can use the freshwater stuff, I used to pump it out to a waterbutt and use it on all my gardens. It probably helped - though I never tested the results

You definitely can't use saltwater. Unless you grow some mangroves at home

[Jelliebabe]

There was a programme on the other night - I think that its called house of the future, and they featured and aquaponics system where they even ate the fish! It looked great and they even had a few smaller systems in the house for herbs and other smaller crops! Very interesting!

[rana]

I saw that program but was sadly disappointed when doing some research.

In the aquaponics system they were growing Tilapia because of their fast growth rate. OK in the tropics but these fish need a temperature of around 80 F.
There was no mention of the huge power requirements or the up front installation costs. Likewise the active hot composter had a motor driven screw to churn the contents and they never mentioned the power consumption required for the indoor veg growing.

In the future the cost of traditional farmed meat may be beyond the means of a normal family - presumably because they have such enormous power bills...............

[Two_Sheds]

aquaponics then takes water from the fish tank rich in nitrate and pumps it over gravel beds or some such, where the plant roots are, they absorb the nitrate and your fish tank gets nice clean water back.

I keep goldfish in my water butts (primarily to eat the mosquito larvae, secondly because I wasn't allowed a pond).
Their poo sinks to the bottom, conveniently where the tap happens to be. I draw off a can of nice rich fish toiletings and use it to water my plants.

Low tech, no lecky

[Matt94]

ive been thinking about getting some fish for my water buts too - going slightly off of topic, im sure in some countries people keep fish in tanks under there house (i think it was zebra danio fish in waste tanks?)

[kingkano]

I saw that program but was sadly disappointed when doing some research.

In the aquaponics system they were growing Tilapia because of their fast growth rate. OK in the tropics but these fish need a temperature of around 80 F.
There was no mention of the huge power requirements or the up front installation costs. Likewise the active hot composter had a motor driven screw to churn the contents and they never mentioned the power consumption required for the indoor veg growing.

In the future the cost of traditional farmed meat may be beyond the means of a normal family - presumably because they have such enormous power bills...............

I saw the show too, that sparked my interest and a little research. Like you I found out its Tilapia which are great fish but yes you need the tanks at 28 degrees all year round - horrendous! Having found the actual people who installed that system online its something like £13k all in - including the building. But still doesnt mention heating requirement, I assume thats extra and would be hideous. Their show system I believe uses air source heat pumps and whatnot. I also think you'd need some supplementary lighting through the winter to keep the vegetation going strong.

You CAN however use trout instead. They'd grow slower and couldnt be stocked as densely. But they are happy down to 12 degrees so alot less heating requirement. Consequently though the vegetable growth would be less too.

It was all a bit glossed over really. This system seems ideal for 'leaf' vegetable growth - lettuces ideal. Who needs 72 lettuces a week though? For anything else there is alot of trace elements missing that would need to be added to the water. Not quite as straightforward as it first appears.