AquA-RounD Filter and Beginning of Move Inside Movement
Excellent!
Journey in creation of outdoor environment indoors, trough replication of natural cycles. Salads for everyone... How to make space for windowsill gardening... everyone is welcome!
As it get's clear, that some of our essential life activities, we can't trust to big monopolies.. foremost I mean food and nutrition. It also get's clear that your food heavily determines your health. When that is sorted properly, official medicine and many more institutions becomes irrelevant.. it will change our values as we realise our needs.
And good news is, that it looks like, growing food is not that hard. It is all about creating cycle.. where it grows. More aspects this cycle covers.. the better. Fish and plants, together, already works well... but it somehow feels disappointing to see those plastic containers, fancy bio-filters and what not... and, I think, I'll start to explore it deeper. I see aquaponic planter already as a fish tank filter.. just need to add missing phases of cycle, some isotopes... or maybe fungi filter, in form of vivariums, could be included.. and make it as natural as possible, and so that the nature does all the hard work and we have time for other things. These are the challenges I'm about to explore and share in this blog.
It all started with fungi and tall grasses in forest.. they made me look how they work with the moisture and how water is traveling in it's many forms.. and also the search for water filter was the grain of idea.
For one and half years I had this setup below...
.. only thing I did to it over that time, was adding some water and fish food...some hemp and avocado seeds, mint was directly from friends garden bringing in some natural fauna.
... and over this time the cycle got really stable.. and finally! Ceramic workshop was set up and running.. it became possible to make any shape vessels for plants... I Up-cycled an old wobbly dining table in to a wonderland...
.. then slow migration process.. in next pictures background is old system. It was very tight to have them both setups on that table.. also had to extend it... luckily I had quite a few off-cuts of 2 by 12 (or something) picked up from work I had stuck in, some time ago.. so its pretty modular table. A lot of planning etc.
.. this is my side project - a dolls house tower with garden.. there is a lot of woodwork jet to be added to a ceramic base and interior
.. garden... I just moved all the life and some stones from the old planter and tank. Avocados didn't made transplanting, too much stress.. and roots were very brittle, there is fig tree, which is doing great, and new avocados sprouting.
There is drawing of my prototype which anyone can add to their existing aquarium.
...and there below is resulting product, I will update here as it develops. It is in sort of experimental stage at the moment. There will be some slight improvements... for example - splash catching tray is being developed.
So far costs to build and set it up is
Plant Containers Short 25 x 17 x 12 high...£60
Plant Containers Long 40 x 17 x 12............£80
Wooden Stand..........................................£80
Pump & Pipework.....................................£40
Fish Tank...................................................£60
Fish Plants Seeds and Growing Medium........£40
Total.............................................................£360
