So I announced last fall that I was going to build an aquapon for year-round indoor gardening and meat production of fish. Despite all the setbacks, frustrations, and money spent, I am finally ready to show you how it looks and proudly announce that it is done. While aspects of it have been functioning fine on their own for a while, not until now have I considered the whole system fully operational. Once I can find my elusive video camera, I will give you a video that walks through the whole thing. But without further ado, here it is!
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| I know the tables are pretty cluttered, but give me a break here folks. |
It's not the prettiest thing in the world, but it works and I am proud of it. Despite all the areas where aesthetics and finer detialed work were sacrificed, I still put a lot of money into this thing.
The big black tank with the Thor cups is where the fish reside and create waste, and that water drains to the shorter sump tank where it is pumped up to the grow beds above. The plants in the grow beds thrive off of the waste created by fish, so they suck it all up and grow nice and tall while the cleansed water is siphoned off back to the fish tank. And because it's a point of curiosity, the Thor cups serve to keep water from falling too far from the drain and splashing all over the floor. The drain has to have its outlet above water so that there is air to create a siphon effect. It makes it a little loud, but we've learned to deal with it. Also, the grow lamp I ordered came in the mail today and is very bright. I quite like it. The company was even kind enough to make an assumption about what I'd be growing indoors and included a lighter equipped with a bottle opener. No joke.
And yes, there are plants already growing. They were started a few months ago (at a point when I thought the system was nearly completed, just before I needed to replace my full-of-water fish tank) and put in the grow beds so that they'd get continually watered. Not all have survived, but those that did continue to be promising.
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| The four big plants are Royal Burgundy Beans, which are a type of bush bean and grow purple pods that turn green as you cook them. If you've been following us for a while, you'll recognize them as the beans Lauren and I fell in love with after planting them in our community garden last summer. The tiny little guy on the left is a green stalk pruned from my roommate's lemon tree. |
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| The four multi-leafed plants in the center are bell pepper plants, which have been growing pretty slowly but very reliably. The bottom left two are kale and the big one on bottom right is cauliflower. The one piddly looking one by the drain is a cucumber vine that may or may not be on its way to dying. |
There are more seedlings germinating and soon we will also have strawberry seeds planted to try and get some fruit going as well :)
Most people haven't done a lot of reading on the subject of aquaponics, so I understand if you are curious or just don't know what's going on here. If you have questions or comments about this type of system please comment below or send me an email and I'd love to help you understand this ingenious system. It's not hard to understand (I mean, come on. I appear to be pulling it off).
On a very different note, in case any of you are curious about how the Real Food diet is going: it's going very well. We are both actually quite pleased about the change in our diets and, despite several instances of reminding the other to stick to the regimen, we are not regretting the decision. If you ever want the recipes to any of our meals, please ask and we're glad to share. I"ll leave you with our most recent creations from the past two days to get your mouths watering.
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| Yesterday's bit meal was a kale salad with homemade mac and cheese. The recipe needs a little tweaking for a better sauce:noodle ratio, but it was still good. |
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| Tonight's dinner was homemade chicken nuggets, the last of the kale salad, and cheesy hash browns. |
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