Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

These are from 14th January

From the top left there is cuban oregano that has seen way better days, a sweet mint clone cutting, some tiny basil seedlings, then some 'local lettuce' and some more basil seedlings.

in the bottom row there is a much better looking basil plant than a week ago. more local lettuce, then another type of small leaf basil plant, followed by some red fire lettuce, romaine lettuce and another red fire lettuce.

So ive got a few varieties of lettuce in the tower... and i just picked up some more 2 week old lettuce plants of even more varieties. Just testing to see what grows best and what tastes best at the end of the day. will try my best to get those 18 plants into the system (if i even have space for them) by the end of saturday. its a little tedious removing soil lol.

So far the growth has been good and in the case of the basil and mint... waaaaay better than i expected. so fingers crossed that it continues to work but its doing well thus far.

Watch out for the yellow leaf edges (the plants on the left of your picture), looks like you're starting to get some potassium deficiency symptoms. A regular spray with kelp extract (usually about 1 or 2% potassium in these) will probably help or you can spray with potassium bicarbonate (1Tablespoon per gallon should work). You can also add potassium during a pH adjustment if you need to do one.

If you wait too long the edges of the lower leaves will die.

You'll find some kelp extract instructions in Mr Damage's post on this thread - http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=30104

Hi KNA,

I'm from the caribbean too

One advice : everything except the plants should be of the shade. It's very important in our tropical climates to keep the water as cool as possible. Fish tank, filters, pipes, etc. should not be exposed to sunlight.
The cooler the water, the better. Warm water promotes bacterial diseases and fungi of all sorts. Also be sure to have powerful oxygenation of your water.

By the way, what is your water temp in the morning ?

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My system, 500 Gallons in a tropical climate : http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=25794

Hey, nice to see someone from this side of the world in here doing good things. The temp in the morning last i measured was around 27C. mid day would get to around 29C. Yeah i think i have a sufficient air pump.. however i think i should setup a backup one. That pump is only 2 or so months old but im gonna invest in a 12v backup one i can run off an old car battery in case anything happens to that one.

growth has been good but i encountered a minor flaw with the system; the sump barrel is way too small. I basically ran out of water in the black 55gal drum which brought my system to a grinding halt. I had to rearrange the whole system to keep the fish alive (1st priority) then the plants. The plants didnt have running water through them for 2 days or so and they suffered, not too badly though. Since my water is so hard and basically unusable in large quantities i couldnt just top it back up. The country is going through a drought of sorts so i havent had proper rain in months really and my rain water stores are completely empty.

The tds of my tap water is 355ppm. i find that it really affects the ph when i put that in the system and right now the system is funcioning nicely with respect to it's chemistry. I really dont want to fiddle with that. I was wondering about getting a regularly inline filter to bring down that tds and see if it could work for topping up purposes when im in tight spots like this.

Also i have an outbreak of something and i need someone to help me with this. It started with my in-soil plants and has now spread to my aquaponics tower. there are black spots and what look like trails on the plants leaves. I snipped off the leaves that were infected with it but it seems to be still popping up pics will be below

What is this?

Latest pics here from wednesday... night, got home late that evening so taken in the dark...