Making a Hydroponic Grow

[Alwese]

My 3 macaws are my main joy in life, but I do have other interests. My neighbor last Fall and I were talking about making a Hydroponic Grow for tomatoes out of what is called an IBC (International Bulk Container) Basically it is a huge plastic tank with a metal cage around it for hauling liquids overseas that appears to hold 365 gallons. I found this very nice British lady showing exactly how this is done in a Youtube video found by plugging the words "Hydroponic" and "IBC" into Google. What is happening here is the bottom tank is for fish; typically Tilapia, but I intend to grow livebearer tropical fish for my large aquarium throughout the summer. They emit wastes containing nitrogen. In the top, water is pumped up and passes through a ring around the edges made of PVC pipe and crosses a gravel bed in which tomatoes are planted. A standpipe keeps the water level in the top about 2 inches below the gravel. The tomatoes take the nitrogen out of the water and grow like crazy which allows far more fish in the tank than normal. This is a very happy arrangement for both the fish and the tomatoes. I built this thing in 4 days and have added fish tank water to "seed" it along with about 20 tomato plants. Real fish will be added to the tank in a month and a half. Click on the thumbnail pictures to enlarge them.

 

[Jtbirds]

Honestly when I first looked at this post I thought something illegal.... My teenage mind getting the best of me I suppose. Sounds very interesting I have always thought it was neat(not In the illegal sense). Thanks for sharing

 

[sodakat]

That is fantastic! My husband is a fish keeper to the nth degree and already has two of those containers; one for R.O. water and one for the reject water the R.O units produce. We have a pump hooked up to the reject tank that we use to fill our washing machine.

I like the idea of trying something like this but am trying to think how hard it would be to clean the bottom of those deep tanks! I can see maybe not needing to do a water change as often because the tomatoes are taking the nitrogen, but the actual waste would still settle to the bottom of the tank.

Cool concept for sure. Thanks for the inspiration.

 

[MikeyTN]

This was something that we wanted to build in the first place, now where can I get a container like that......

 

[Alwese]

This was something that we wanted to build in the first place, now where can I get a container like that......

I waited for a while for one to come my way. They have a helashious deposit on those, but my neighbor knew I was looking for one and one got dumped where he works. Here in Jacksonville FL there is a lot of shipping business to overseas. My tank bottom plate was a little damaged from forklift action, but was good enough to hold gravel. You can do this with some other kind of container, but the metal framework made it really sturdy and worked very well.

 

[MikeyTN]

I found one locally on craigslist but they want $150 for one of those things. A place in KY is only $50 I'm gonna try to find another place that carries them. I would get it in KY if I had a truck to haul it.

 

[Alwese]

Today I found yet another use for this. When I went out to check on it, a flock of sparrows was taking turns taking a bath in the shallow water on the top grow area. This is going to work out really super. For this unit I already had a pump called a Rio that I got for the aquarium years ago. I went looking for more pumps in the 300-500 gallon per hour range at pet stores, Lowes and Home Depot. Theyall wanted about the same at around $85. The place to go is Harbor Freight Tools! - the one I got there with a discount coupon was only $14. For people trying to grow edible fish, the fish of choice now is called Arctic Char. They are the best tasting, fastest growing fresh water fish and tolerate extremely low water temperatures. Google Arctic Char and see what you get.

 

[MikeyTN]

I already have all the pumps I need!!! I used to have saltwater fish tanks so I've got mag 5, mag 12, mag 7, etc. I'm a big time fisherman so I may have to go catch some blue gills to stock it IF I build one. I'm not gonna eat them as I don't like to eat most fish except a few. But I will look up Arctic Char.

 

[aliray]

Wow that is quite a project. Good job