Aquaponics - using Fish Waste

You can eat crayfish no problem; some Aquaponic systems use them specifically for that.

As far as the gold fish they will get as big as the tank allows and provide plenty of nutrients. If I want more I just feed them more. Again I will state I have grown cucumbers, squash, lettuce, and peppers with these fish when they were feeder fish.

It is not my first time I have done this for almost two years just not with herb. The only thing I did have to add for the peppers was epson salts.

o.k. I need to be more elaborate...I don't make hash- therefore, the trim that goes in the teawater tank(tank #2) is top quality...you're feeding ganja to your ganja; there are massive differences in quality of trim- like olive oil...some are virgin, others are second rate. the whole teawater thing is meant as tea for an organic medium of the highest order. the tea feeds the micosphere, which feeds the plants. {this is part of my version of soil regeneration-(worldwide!), 'cause pesticides,herbicides and artificial fertilizers have poisoned the soil.}. ideally; I would be raising a cross section of mississippi watershhed 'rough fish', and bluegills, with mudpuppies and crawdads...ya'see, the more diverse strains of natural bacteria, the better. the closer we can get to super mimicry, the better. the teawater scheme works better with sunlight and warmth. the idea is to create a louzianna bayou of algae water, then empty that into tank # 2(minus the fish!).refill tank#1 with clean fresh water. let the teawater bubble for at least a few days, adding liberal amounts of trim. you can also throw some azomite, kelp meal,etc. to customize it.I'd avoid using guano if your pets or varmints are drinking out of it(usually they're more interested in the fishtank(#1) water.). the real magic of this trick is AEROBIC decomposition. if you hit your plants with anaerobic tea, you'll find out the hard way! I think aerobic teawater is the biggest thing that's about to hit the organic mainstream. I want to see every urban victory garden-to every village in the developing world running teawater on as large a scale as possible. that, coupled with carbonizing, and saturation fertilizing(innocuous redundancy), would turn once poisoned soil to 'terra preta'. that's my life's mission.

Another week and the first seedling is doing fine. It got over ran by the tomatoes and experienced some stretching try to find light.

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However, the second seedling does not seem to be doing anything at all. I figure the seed had issues after all it is only a few years old and probably not a very strong strain.

All other plants just going crazy as well to include tomatoes, lettuce (I have been eating it), onions and chives.

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Lights are burning tomatoes and I am going to redesign the way my grow room is so that I can have the lights drop from the ceiling avaoiding the burn.

I wonder what types of yields you can get out of this? Also, wouldn't a perilite medium be able to filter fishpoop better than hydroton?

Any medium will work that bacteria can live in. When i run out of hydroton I will start to use gravel it is cheap and lasts. My conceern will be the P phase.

So I just learned about the bell auto siphon and found ur post in google. So, just keep it flooded and do somewhat of an NFT instead of the flood n drain? Hmm....

It seems to me if you can have fast and complete enough ( as in, there are no "dead" spaces of water that are caught in a current trap and the water doesnt move, like in a corner ), you can get away without the auto siphon. But, maybe if you have really slow water input, or the container ur growing it doesnt allow full movement of all areas of water, u gotta use flood n drain. I like ur setup and look forward to updates!

I have moved the seedling to a fish tank by itself so the roots do not get tangled up.


Other plants are doing fine I have moved them around and went with a 8 bulb bloom CFL it was more effecient than the three
lights easier to manage.



Some lady bugs for color


DTP water gets all around and even if there were a dead spot the roots will find the water. The hydroton also wicks between spaces so the entire table has plenty of water with only two trickles going. I did the bell siphon and found it to be easily screwed up and went with the ease of NFT. Not too much can go wrong with a trickle the only problem I have had is the lines fell out a couple of times when I move stuff around and they hit the floot.

Nice progress, Personified. By nft do you mean a constant trickle thru your hydroton to an open drain? My first AP grow was that way, but roots and gunk eventually plugged the drain, so I had to add a higher drain to prevent overflow. Then the higher one plugged, so I had to regularly yank roots out of the drains, and stab a screwdriver in to loosen up the media. Now I use gravel guards and bell siphons. The gravel guard allows me to completely remove the siphons and hose them out every month or so, much better. The trouble with nft is the lack of surface area of media that regularly gets both wet and oxygenated. If you top trickle, most of the media ends up getting wet, but then the surface tends to get covered in algae and attracts fungus gnats. If you use a bell siphon, all of the media gets wet except the top 2", keeping the algae and fungus gnats away, plus way better biofiltration, in my experience.

I need to snap some pictures and share them. Love your project

I do top trickle I consider it NFT since it starts at the top and drains at the bottom. I never have had an algae problem if I did I would throw straw on top the chloriphile will stop it. Never have had problem with roots either but if I did I would do as you tear roots out. I have two holes in case one drain fails. Nor have I ever had a problem with the roots getting nutrients my plants thrive.

I guess I am lucky

About 10 years ago i dug a fish pond in the back yard.It's about 15ft across and 5ft deep.it has probably around 20 carp,and coi 4-12 inches long.this pond and fish have been healthy all these years. Do you think I could do an outside grow using ths??

eight yes I think that would be fine. Sounds like the eco system is in balance and that you could just start running through some gravel the bacteria will grow rapidly.

This week my plant is looking a little beat up.


It is getting to wet and the air pump was pumping water ont he leaves. In addition I moved it and there is not enough hydroton to filter properly so I think it is a little hot for the plant. I have not had time to address these issues but I must or the plant is going to die. So next up date should see changes.

While I had to move the seedling I should not have. The new medium did not have enough time to set up nor enough medium to filter.
The seedling is pretty burnt. I am sure i could save her but I need the space and the set up will have to be completely different for flower.

So at this point I am going to put her to death and move on until next time when I can set it up proper.


I threw a clipping in the water and it is growing and very green which confuses me however no roots after 10 days.



So until next time this is done so I can make space for some dirt plants.

Well here is an updte on the same plant. Not much growth over all this time however it is under bloom light. I do not think aquaponics can deliver enough of a variety of needed nutrients for mj. The same is true for the tomatoes I planted they grow like mad but no fruit not even flowers.

I think I will thow this one in hydro and see how that goes then determine sex.

i came across your thread by accident, and have been enlightened. I just realized 'aquaponics' recently. Being a fish breeder since I was 5, I've always had the fear of wasting water. Now since I started growing I have been using the water from my water changes as a supplement to feed my plants. I've been doing this for a while a never dawned on me to actually hook the tank up to the grow. This has revolutionized my approach. I'm going to begin combining the two. Just fell in love with aquariums and marijuana yet again!

Well I left the plant in and now she is getting big. Took a while to get caught up but now she (I hope) is on a growing spree. So I am back to thinking aquaponics may work.

Yo your fish are not going to be very happy in that setup. I know goldfish; they're going to need some colored gravel, a clay castle to swim through and at least 1 scuba man blowing bubbles. Though 2 scuba men will give you the best fish poop. I'm talking optimal turds.

Seriously though, that thank looks boring. Those fish are doing work for you, hook em up with some entertainment.

Vapekush said:

Yo your fish are not going to be very happy in that setup. I know goldfish; they're going to need some colored gravel, a clay castle to swim through and at least 1 scuba man blowing bubbles. Though 2 scuba men will give you the best fish poop. I'm talking optimal turds.

Seriously though, that thank looks boring. Those fish are doing work for you, hook em up with some entertainment.

Click to expand...

Yeah sometimes I think about that. Then again now after two years not to sure.

Awesome! another aquaponics grower! i dont do mj in my system, but i have tried cloning and 15 days later, no roots either. Definitely subbed!

I love this idea. I start heard about it recently and haven't seem many grows being done with it. I hope it works out great for you and I'm really curious to see how much you can cut down on your use of fertilizers.

hybrid ap + nutes system working well. btw, i've had composting red worms survive, thrive, reproduce in ebb/flow hydroton. they love it. vermiponics never worked out, but they'll eat uneaten fish food. my current ap grow:
https://www.rollitup.org/hydroponics-aeroponics/559989-flowering-aquaponics-revisited.html