Aquaponics Doesnt Have to Be Ugly

3:51 AM in Aqua, aquaponics, be, doesnt, have, to, ugly

My hubby has been itching to build a new aquaponic garden.  He has had an IBC tote cluttering up the garage for several weeks.

The problem is that we are running out of space.  We do not have much growable space to begin with.  Some of what we do have is shaded.  The areas that get enough sun for growing edibles are already occupied by aquaponic gardens or conventional soil beds.

Little Okra

He has been eying our swimming pool deck and commenting about the abundance of sun it receives.  Of course it does, who puts a swimming pool in the shade?  I could see where the hints were going.  By the time he said he wanted to put an aquaponic garden by the pool, I had accepted that this was going to happen.  I just wanted to minimize the damage. 

By damage, I mean that our house is built around the pool area.  It is visible from most rooms in the back of the house.  I did not want to look at something ugly.  Let’s face it, most aquaponic gardens are collections of tubs, barrels, buckets and lots of pipes and tubing.  These components are not terribly attractive.  While our existing aquaponic gardens are not eyesores, they are not exactly things of beauty.  Even though they are full of beautiful growing things, I dont want something like that the focal point of the back of my house.

I was willing to compromise (one of the reasons we have been married for over 30 years) and he was willing to compromise (another reason our marriage has lasted so long).  I agreed to the IBC, if he agreed to do some extra work so that it was not an ugly eyesore.

IBC Aquaponic Garden

Voila!  He clad the system in pressure treated lumber so that it will withstand the elements and from the house, it almost looks like a hot tub! The bottom holds 125 gallons and the top gives us a grow area of roughly 4 feet by 4 feet. Plenty of room for the tilapia and veggies!  He fitted it with a bell siphon, but I would like to change it over to a timed flood and drain. I like the way that method performs on the larger systems.

This past week end we began cycling.  Because I can’t stand for the fish to die, we are cycling with ammonia.  You can read my January post about my experiences cycling with and without fish and come to your own conclusions about cycling with fish.

Just to start, I put in some purple hull peas and Cajun Jewel okra.  I already have plenty of okra in our other grow beds and even some in rafts and NFT tubes, so I think we can expect a large crop of okra.  Unfortunately, because it is the rainy season, there is very little we can grow.  Summer in South Florida is like winter in the Midwest or North, there are very few edible plants that can survive.

Which brings me to an RIP moment.  One of the first thunderstorms that came barreling off the Everglades produced a lightening strike that has taken out one of my coconut palm trees.  As you can see in this photo, the tree is dying and you can even see the stripe on the tree trunk where the lightening exited. 

Coconut Tree with Lightening Scar

 It appears that the areca palm next to the coconut is a goner as well.  The areca only went in after hurricane Wilma.  The coconut is over 20 years old.  I  will miss them.  Its like saying good-bye to an old friend.

Areca with burned fronds

Do you get attached to your trees?

Read more

We Have a God who Promised to be With Us

6:30 PM in a, Aqua, be, god, have, promised, to, us, we, who, with

Bishop Lawrence Reddick, senior bishop of the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church and presiding prelate of the 8th Episcopal District, offers this New Years blessing and greeting for 2016. Bishop Reddick is a member of the Bread for the World board of directors.

Read more

There Will be Pests

2:49 PM in Aqua, be, pests, there, will

An early morning check of one of my systems really pissed me off.  Oh the fish were doing well, the bed was flooding and draining properly, most plants looked great except.......................the tomato.  Leaves were eaten and it was covered in little flecks of bug poo.

The tomato hornworm had struck overnight (or since my last check yesterday afternoon).  This isnt my picture, but this is what they look like.

This photo is from University of Colorado

I have to show you the picture someone else took because I was so angry I immediately hunted them all down and squished them until they were DEAD.  In a survival garden, it is the gardener that will survive, not the unwanted visitors.  Pests such as the hornworm must die, immediately.  My frenzy did not subside until the last hornworm was nothing but a green mess.

Like all gardens, aquaponics gardens have pests.  Because of the fish component, you cannot just spray poison on your plants.  Even without the presence of fish, I dont like to spray poison because I really dont want to end up eating it.  There are several ways to approach pest control in your aquaponic garden.  The cheapest is the method I employed on the hornworms.  That means searching the plant, pulling the pest off and squishing it or cutting it with shears or any other means of physical demise of the pest.  If your garden is small and your amount of time for pest control large, this is the most common method.

However, if you have a large gardens this might not be practical.  At our Together We Stand gardens, we use the pick and squish method when we have a large number of volunteers and a small number of pests.  This pick and squish method works great for squash bugs as well as those dreaded hornworms.  However, our most common method is the application of a biological pesticide such as Bacillus thuringiensis.  This is a bacteria that naturally occurs in some soils.  This bacteria is highly toxic to many caterpillars and other garden pests, but it is safe for higher life forms (that means you, your fish, your dog, your chickens, your cats, etc).  It can be found most commonly under the name DiPel. This is what we use when the pests outnumber the volunteers.  It is kinda stinky, so you have been warned. If your garden is organic but not aquaponic, you can use DiPel and keep your organic status.  You do have to be careful with the application if your garden has an area for butterfly gardening.  While butterflies are not normally part of a survival garden, their nectar plants are commonly planted in the garden area to attract pollinators. You can bet the drain and flow system that housed those hornworms is getting a dose of DiPel!

You can also use companion plants as pest deterrents.  My father always planted marigolds around his garden.  I hated the smell of the marigolds and he always assured me that most pests agreed with me and would stay out of the garden because they hated marigolds as well.  This year I tested the marigolds I despise so much in the NFT tubes above one of my flood and drain grow beds.  Very little pest problems at all  Marigolds are famous for warding off nematodes (which are not a problem in aquaponic gardens since you are not using soil) but they worked very well for whitefly too! While the plants near the marigolds still attracted a few aphids, it was nothing like the aphids that tried to flock to other areas of the gardens.  So like them or not, marigolds are here to stay in my garden.

Just like any garden, the aquaponic garden must be walked at least once a day during growing season to check for pests and arrange for their demise when found.

Got any ideas on organic pest control?  Share them with me!

Read more