新车间 [Xinchejian]

Check out the link for the step by step to build aquaponic box with Ikea Samla.

Thanks to Roger who planted some new veggies in the aquaponic and got the LED grow light setup.

Location:Huashan Road,,China

I have been having red spider mites problems with my balcony hydroponic garden. These bugs are tough and hard to kill. I have tried a few organic pesticides but none of them work. They are eating up the cucumber and sunflower leaves.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

We are going to open the 4th Mini Workshop of Acquaponic and Hydroponic system this Saturday (25th) at XinCheJian from 2pm to 3pm.  Open to XinCheJian Members; and the workshop is free to attend.

The pic below is the hydroponic box we built up 10 days ago at XinCheJian Mini Workshop (#3) and now, they are ready for harvest!

Very amazing growth

The planter built a week ago is doing well on my balcony. Here is the before and after photos.

A week ago

Today

To counter the harsh Sun of Shanghai summer, a Sun Shade Cover is added.

Also, 100 earth worms are added to help process the organic matter in the system. Hope they can survive with constant ebb and flow.

Finally, over 300 Chinese green, tomato, cucumbers, eggplants, and sun flowers are transplanted and we should be ready to harvest in about 4 weeks.

The basils and chives transplanted into the system are growing amazingly.

My outdoor aquaponic farm survived well through the typhoon Haikui hitting Shanghai. The few plants in the grow bed did well and starting to show amazing growth.

The basil at the middle are growing beautifully. Basil are not used much in the home cooking. Anyone who like to taste some aquaponic basil, let me know. I will bring some to the space.

The system is still showing some sign of the young aquaponic system, a bit iron deficiency. Chelated iron has been added to improve that as well as a bag of coral skeleton is added as PH buffer.

Finally, the seedlings are ready to be transplanted and time to get the hydroponic planter ready.

The planter is ordered from Taobao. Good size and come with the drainage screen at the bottom.

Fix the aquarium air stone strip to the bottom of the drainage screen. Thanks to Rocket’s suggestion with his background in water processing, the air stone is mounted upside down. This is really clever one. It avoids deposit on top of the stone to make the strips last longer. Cool idea!

A small piece of PVC pipe with holes is used to tell water level and fixed on to the screen with cable tie.

PVC pipe is used to protect the air pipe from be squeezed by the ceramic ball.

All done and ready to fill in the ceramic balls.

Big ones at the bottom with 2 cm deep of small one covering the top. While filling in the nutrient solution, make sure only up to the big ones’ height and keep the small one dry. The small one is mainly used to insulate the lights and heat of the Sun from reaching the solution to prevent algae growth and heating up the solution.

Transplanted some cucumbers, sun flowers, and other seedlings started in the past few weeks.

Some words of advice, soak the ceramic ball in the water a few days before setting up the system so they will sink into the water. At the last picture, the big ball float to the top while I was planting the seedling.

It’s almost a month since I setup the aquaponic system in Gubei. I have learn a lot about this amazing technology and make fair amount of mistakes. But now, the plants are growing and the fishes are swimming. The system now has 5 grown carps and 10 Tilapia fingerlings and the waters are in good cycles with 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite and good amount of nitrate for plants food. This is becoming a stable aquaponic system.

Now, I just have to wait for the batch of seedlings ready to transplant as well as getting a few more fish fingerlings.

We are getting seedlings from the first urban farming workshop. Thanks to Jia Qi for letting us borrowing her lights.

Summary for Wednesday
We’ll have 2 guests this weekend Saola and Damrey will be visiting – both tropical storms, while that’s going on outside, we’ll be building up a storm inside! it’s time to get your hack on!

David and Roger will be running another mini workshop this weekend, this time you’ll build your own simple hydroponics box to take home, with two different systems you’ll need to let David know by Wednesday, 150 – 200 rmb in materials but you’ll have a ready to use system to take home, contact david@xinchejian.com for more information.

The awesome Barcamp is coming, sign up at http://www.techyizu.org/events/shanghai-barcamp-fall-2012/ for September – do it now, tell them you’re from xinchejian! XinCheJian will make our presence known, last time XinCheJian ran operation “Occupy Barcamp”, this season we’re taking it a step up; if you want to be a part of the XinCheJian Barcamp movement – then contact nihaopaul@xinchejian.com

if you have something to say, we want to hear, let us know if you wish to present on wednesday@xinchejian.com but please read the guidelines

Presentations

• Spencer a demonstration of partkeepr, and how to find what you need in XinCheJian
• David and Roger on Urban Farming
• Sunny Sun Jr. research and explosions

Wednesday Presenters

• Spencer (XinCheJian)- Partkeepr, designed for use in places with lots of parts, like hackerspaces this tool will help you cost out your projects and also find what you’re looking for and much more.
• David and Roger (XinCheJian) will be talking about changing the farming area, along with their new Talapia, which have been named already!
• Sunny Sun Jr (XinCheJian|not Agent squishy) at age unknown, but we guess he’s not 18 yet – will be talking about his latest research into Ultrabright LEDS, tiny fast motors and HUGE electromagnets!