I've been interested in creating food generation systems for a long time. While gardening is satisfying, it doesn't stimulate my engineering mind that much. Sure, I have made some improvements to normal gardening with integrated water storage systems (basically its PVC piping with a wick), but all in all, we plant seeds and they grow.
I'm way more interested in aquaponics. For those that don't know, aquaponics is a relatively closed loop system where you have a fish tank and a growing area. The fish waste provides nutrients for the plants, the plants give back, by cleaning up the water. There are other steps in there and the internet is full of information about it.
Anyway, I wanted an aquaponic system in a little shed I had built. There isnt much space or light in there so there are extra challenges in making it work. Since lighting space is limited, I have gone with vertical lighting, but I can only place it in certain areas, so I decided to put plants in spinning barrels, with the nutrient water shooting on to the roots inside the system. Its like aeroponics, where there is a mist of nutrient spray for the roots, but water never touches the leaves.
Anyway, here is a video that shows the entire set up.
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And here is a video that just focuses on the media grow bed.
(this link)[]
I dont have plants or fish yet, I'm still working out some of the intricacies. But stay tuned!