Fishy Tomatoes
Posted on May 14, 2008 under Aquaponics, Fish, Gardening | 5 Comments
After a bit more tweaking, the barrelponics system is up and running! I have put seven little goldfish in that I had rescued from our 800 liter goldfish tank before the big ones could eat them. The little ones overwintered in our tropical aquarium but where now getting big enough to eat the guppy fry, so they needed a new home anyway.
I have taken one of the tomato plants that I had planted in the garden a few weeks ago and moved it into the aquaponics barrel. Another one that is almost exactly the same size will stay in the soil. This should be a nice test to compare how the two plants develop and how much fruit they produce, let the waiting game begin!
May 16th, 2008 at 9:32 pm
Good to see a side by side comparison, Nico!
if the aquaponic tomato doesn’t perform as well as the soil one then you may want to repeat the exact same experiment in 12 months. You’ll be surprised.
siphons certainly take a bit of tweaking but when you get them right they’re great!
May 17th, 2008 at 6:12 am
Yeah, I’m not really sure what to expect. The soil has been well fertilized with cow manure and the aquaponics setup only has 7 little goldfish that don’t eat too much yet because of their size. The aquaponics tomatoes however have the benefit of having access to more water. We’ll just have to wait and see how things develop.
May 18th, 2008 at 11:00 am
The only additive I have heard of using in an aquaponics system is iron, because the pH fish like locks out iron for the plants. I hope your barrelponics unit is a success.
May 18th, 2008 at 11:07 am
I used to dose some iron additive into my aquarium for better plant growth, but I’m not sure how food-save that stuff is. I’ll let the system age for a bit and then test the water to see what trace elements are missing.
July 13th, 2011 at 2:41 pm
Good luck on your Tomato plants! Once they are grown, they’re so useful to have in your garden!