Aquaponics - Cucumber sprouts

Every single one of the capsicum sprouts got munched by slugs.

Now I have cucumber sprouts that have worked realy well in the bean sprout sprouter.

These seem to have done particularly well in the sprouter, but that could just be because they are a large seed, and make a large sprout.








I'm calling using a bean sprout sprouter to raise seedlings for aquaponics, a total success.

This cucumber sprout is around 240mm in total length from tip of root to leaves.

That's a big sprout.

All grown from seed in the bean sprout sprouter, and all strong, healthy, and best of all totally organic.

Actually the real "best of all", is that it doesnt contain any dirt that needs washing off before planting in the system.

Also, it's length means the roots should reach nearly to the bottom of my grow beds.

Much more than they need to find all the water and nutrient they could desire.



And all that means they should have no problems growing.





120 Things in 20 years - struggling without a spell checker to post anything at all, but still managing to put some semi-science out there in the form of my Aquaponics cucumber sprouts.

Aquaponics - Pest control flooding

One of the excelent by products of growing your vegitables and herbs in water and media filled containers, is your ability to get rid of pests.

Before I replant my grow bed, I flood it for a half hour or so and see what's been living in my media.

Lots of beasties only come out at night, and hide during the heat of the day.

Especially slugs.





Almost impossible to track down in a conventional garden without just dumping poison everywhere, a flooded grow bed quickly brings them all to the surface, and climbing the walls to get to high ground.

Then it's simply a case of collecting them and feeding them to the fish.

I've been thinking of approaches to an aquaponics based snail farm, (I guess Helioponics) and that in turn has me thinking about  a growbed that you could flood deep enough to introduce the fish to.

It's also led to some thoughts on snail barriers.


120 Things in 20 years has be thinking about thinking about things

Aquaponics - Slugs 2

In keeping with my policy of being wrong from time to time, it doesn't seem to be slugs eating my strawberries.

The night before last it was raining, and the slugs were out in force on the paths around the small aquaponics test system, so if ever there was a night for my trap to work, it should have been this one.

My beer trap managed to trap exactly no slugs whatsoever.

It did however manage to catch a number of very small flies. I doubt they could have been the culprits, but the fact that they like beer may indicate they like fruit. Often bugs seem to be attracted to the ethanol produced in decaying fruit.

My strawberries where in good  health, and not at all over ripe, so who knows.

I might try flooding my garden bed to see what crawls out.

Aquaponics - Slugs

As much as I wanted to eat my first strawberry, it turns out something else wanted to eat it more.

I like slugs as much as the next guy, but now I like slugs as much as the next guy if the next guy has just lost his first strawberries to slugs the day before he was going to eat them.









If the neighbourhood slugs are willing to share their half eaten strawberries with the me, its only natural that I should be willing to offer them a small spill of my beer. So I will.

A beer snail and slug trap consists of a small bowl of beer. That's all it takes to draw all the slugs from my nice organic produce into the depths of depravity, and drunken stupor.

















Unlike the thirty or fourty years it might take my fellow humans to die from over indulgence, slugs achieve this feat within hours. Or so I'm told.

I can wait all night.













Is there anything beer cant do?