2013 - Year #1

Our first year of growing was a learning year for sure.  We started the green house plants late so we did not get a lot of production however we feel that it was a successful year considering.....

1. How many fish do we need?  Well, we started with 5 and ended with 10.  We chose a variety of gold fish (Shubunkins and Comets, 6" to 10").  These were chosen for their tolerance for temperature extremes, here in New England the water temperature will be a high of 90+ but will freeze over in the winter, so the fish need to tolerate the climate and these will (and have).
   
2. Don't over feed the fish.  It will just muck up the water.
3. What type of water plants do we need and what type?  We chose some perennial and seasonal but what you really need is to cover a certain % of the water with plants to help keep the pH balanced, also the fish could use a place to hide.
4. The water needs to be filtered (you don't want the fish poop, only the nitrates) so we added a filter box to the pump and it seems to work just fine.
5. The pH needs to be below 7 in  order to grow healthy plants in the green house.  The plants are much more sensitive to the pH than the fish are.
6. Plan ahead...The plants will grow large so planning where they need to be in the grow beds takes some experience.  We just plopped them in anywhere and before long we had a tangled mess of plants blocking other plants.
7. Herbs grow very well (anywhere)
8. Tomatoes have large roots and need to stay away from the bell siphons
9. Don't be afraid to trim and prune as a means of keeping the plants under control.

Above:  The top pipe (4" PVC) is where the pump feed pipe starts (way in the back).  This water runs down and nurtures the grow baskets in the pipe.  This is a great spot to grow lettuce and herbs.  The pipe then feeds the grow bed manifold along the top of the grow beds and finally drains back into the pond.

 Things grow at lease twice as fast than our standard garden.  Very little (if no) weeds.

What grew well the first year??

1. Lettuce....yes, we had a good yield of lettuce.  The heads grew best in the grow baskets located in the upper 4" pipe.  When the head was ready to eat, we just removed the grow basket, pulled out the head and replaced it with a new seeds.
2. Herbs.....Mostly basil.  The basil seemed to grow best down in the media beds.  The other herbs, oregano, sage, thyme and parsley grew well where ever we put it.
3. Tomatoes.....had a late start and the high pH seemed to effect them.  we finally got some fruit late in the season.
4. Peppers.....did not do well, again I look to the pH level.  I think if we have a full season at the proper pH we will be OK.

The End of the Season:

We made it into mid December before a frost finally hit the plants.  The tomatoes and peppers did not make it and what ever lettuce was left was growing very slowly.  The herbs (except basil) are still alive and well but again growing very slowly.

We added some heat in the form of five 100 watt light bulbs along with an electric heater but when the outside temperature dropped below 15 degrees F, they could not keep up.  We found out (too late) that a forced hot air electric heater blowing across the tops of the grow beds works the best in keeping the plants from a frost.  Next winter we will remember this and hope to extend the season a bit further.

This has been an unusually cold winter, throughout the month of January the temperature did not raise above 20 degrees F and at night we have had lows of -5 degrees F.  Using the forced hot air heater (1500Watts) and the 5 x 100 watt light bulbs we have managed to stay 15 to 20 degrees above the outside temperature.

Disaster Hits the System

During one of the cold snaps (January 26th) we walked out to the green house to check up on the system like we do most days.  When I opened the door I was hit with the smell of pond water and silence, the system was shut-down and more disturbing was that the water in the pond was nearly gone.  The cold temperatures had frozen the water return line (the bypass) and broke the pipe.  This caused the water to drain into the gravel floor of the green house instead of the pond.  Fortunately, the pump does not sit on the very bottom of the pond, it sits up about 6 inches.  In that 6" deep puddle the fish were all huddled together and seemed to be doing fine.  Lorraine and I went into "save the fish mode." Lorraine began lugging buckets of water out to the pond and I began looking for a way to begin filling the pond back up with a hose (600+ gallons).  With all of the hoses frozen solid (it was 10 degrees F outside) and the outside faucets not be useable, I remembered I had a long coil of air-line for my compressed air tools so I spliced an old washing machine hose onto one end of the air line and began filling the pond from the faucet that feeds our washing machine.

I'm happy to say that the fish are all OK and did not seem to notice that there was a problem.