Aquaponics System, Passive Solar Greenhouse build

[pinballlooking]

I had a chance to work on my stands some more. I am welding the last stand for this row.
I need to build a bracket/stand to go around the post. When I cut down the pallet racking and when I put it back together I needed to make it a little wider to fit the 55 gallon barrels between the rails. This put my DWC stand hitting the main beam. Time to start welding to fix it.

[pinballlooking]

My DWC (deep water culture) bed is getting closer to being done. I am working on the pluming now.
After that I will tape the seams and put in the liner.

I should add the stands are the ones I bought from craigslist and cut them up weld them to work for this. The base under the insulation is galvanized metal roofing that I took off a screened porch 12 years ago and saved it. The insulation is the reclaimed I bought off craigslist (Scrubbed with hot soapy water with a brush). The white PVC fence was reused from our square foot garden.
So everything except the liner was repurposed.

[pinballlooking]

The plants are really taking off. I need to get a couple more pluming fittings for the DWC bed.

[pinballlooking]

I bought my first 25 lbs bag of fish food a year ago. I have not used all maybe a pond left. It is too old so I bought a new bag. This one should get all used up. I still hope to get more fish this Friday.

I have installed greenhouse defused polycarbonate on most of the greenhouse. I have three patio glass door panels in the middle. The plants are doing so much better where the defused polycarbonate is. Not by a small amount by a huge amount.

Here is a picture the top left it in front of the clear glass. The bottom left is part clear poly carb part defused poly carb part glass the right picture is defused poly carb.
This is not conclusive part of the tomatoes on the right are in front of the glass window.



This is my first time pollinating tomatoes and it is going really well. I would consider to outdoor tomatoes.

I am still wondering if I should screen out the outside world and pest. I know it will slow down air flow some what do you all think screen out pest or let the air flow.

[jeff5may]

Believe me, that white greenhouse and/or shadecloth will save your plants when hot temperatures roll in. Much like what you are seeing with the diffused light of the poly panels, the stuff acts as sunscreen and heat shields for the inside space. When I was running my greenhouse, I put it over the top section about now in the year. After about tax time (April 15), it got rolled all the way down over the clear film. I made this a routine procedure after running spring trials, pitching a pup tent over a section of the beds around St. Patrick's Day. Once germinated, the young seedlings just grew better in the tent, even though they were getting somewhat less light intensity. Not just a little better, more like 30 - 40 percent better. Mature plants had somewhat less dramatic effects in the early season.

Use your stale fish food as compost turbocharger and worm food. It really packs a punch. Don't let it get too wet, though, because it likes to mold up.

Unless you want to fight off the wasps and bumblebees, keep your greenhouse sealed up. I could tell I had a hole somewhere in mine when they started appearing inside. Once they get in, they can't get out, and get angry. I always had a can of brake cleaner or raid by the door just in case, because they try to dive bomb you upon entry. Even with screens and such, you may end up with mites or aphids, and they are a big enough problem to deal with on their own.

[pinballlooking]

I bought the 1” grow grips, 250 of them so I do hope they work out. These will go into the 1” foam holes and are reusable.



I have 5 extra ½ sheets of greenhouse defused poly carb. I will look at a way to put these in front of the clear glass for the spring / summer.
This will cut down the heat and as you suggest it will defuse the light.

It is getting much warmer in SC now. My fish water still drops a couple degrees each night. But I only have to run the heat exchanger a couple hours to gain back the water temp. I have been keeping the fish temp no about 79-81 degrees F.
I am all set to pick up more tilapia tomorrow.

[pinballlooking]

I have 42 new tilapia in my fish tank. I used plastic over my stock tank with a ratchet strap. This did a good job keeping the water in the tank.
The fish are about 3” - 5” most of them are 4”- 5”
These fish came from another aquaponics system.


It is funny I have one decent size tilapia and he was hiding from the new fish under the heat exchanger.



I will add a couple plant pictures.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXeIf...ature=youtu.be

[pinballlooking]

I put in a bunch of L brackets to hold the PVC 2 X 6’s. I taped up the seams and any sharp edges. This all should help protect the liner.

These are DIY L brackets. I just bought aluminum angle. Then I cut up with my hand band saw. The pack of L brackets were too much and they would rust.



I am filling the bed with rain water.

[jeff5may]

Aluminum angle iron?

[pinballlooking]

Originally Posted by jeff5may

Aluminum angle iron?

Just aluminum angle no iron in this one. I changed it above.

I have been able to exclusivity use collected rain water for my system. With using rain water to pick up the new fish topping off the system and this new bed I am running low on rain water.
Mother Nature needs to help me out here.