I got my ordered copy of Growing Under Glass
, a book by Kenneth A. Beckett in the mail yesterday. It contains a big section about different types of greenhouses, finding the best location for your greenhouse and how to build your own. All information I obviously don’t need, since we already have our greenhouses. Still, it was a very interesting read!
The book covers about everything you need to know about building a greenhouse, equipping it and growing plants in it. It teaches you how to prepare your soil as well as less known planting methods like growing in straw bales. Growing plants from seeds as well as propagating cuttings are extensively covered and everything is accompanied by clear, step by step, illustrations.
I own quite a few gardening books, but if I had to pick my favorite one, Growing Under Glass
These past 2 months have been very eventful, but we are about settled now. The first 4000 liter fish tank has been set up inside the greenhouse. For now it houses goldfish. We’ll have to see how temperatures develop in the greenhouse throughout the winter. I will probably build a shed around the fish tank and connected grow bed and equip it with a grow light to be able to grow some veggies this winter.
Sorry, no pictures at the moment, as the USB cable for the camera is still in one of the unpacked moving boxes…
]]>I thought I’ll use the long weekend to set up a little half barrel aquaponics system. I still had one of those blue barrels laying around, so I went ahead and cut it in half to create two grow beds. After filling the grow beds with washed gravel and filling them with water the troubles started: I was using a loop siphon to do the ebb and flow in the barrel, but the loop just didn’t work like it should. When filling the barrel, the siphon should kick in at a set level and empty the barrel again, giving the plant roots access to oxygen rich air. After the barrel has been emptied the siphon should break and the barrel should slowly fill up with water again.
My siphon either wouldn’t kick in correctly, leaving the barrel flooded, or it wouldn’t break, leaving the barrel empty at all times. Some more tweaking is necessary for my barrelponics to work. Since I don’t have to go to work today, I’ll have all day to try to get this working.
If I want to set up a big aquaponics system I need some big water tanks and grow beds. Looking at various suitable tanks, they all had one thing in common: a very high price tag! Living self-sufficient means doing a lot of DIY, so I went on searching for a low cost alternative to use as tanks. I quickly stumbled upon ferro cement, which is basically a 3:1 sand and cement mixture with chicken wire used as rebar.
The strength of the chicken wire concrete is amazing and the uses are endless! Entire houses are being build with ferro cement and due to how these structures are build, you can go nuts and make your house a piece of art. Once finished, your structure will be truly low maintenance and it can withstand earthquakes and hurricanes.
I’m not building a house but fish tanks and grow beds both need to be sufficiently strong to be able to hold their contents and be water tight. The ferro cement is water tight and is used to build water containers around the globe. Because of its low cost it is used a lot in developing countries. The biggest saving comes from the incredible strength of the material, with the need of much thinner walls, compared to rebar concrete, you will only have a fraction of the material costs.
]]>