I have been concerned for some time about how the fish will fare during the winter as it gets quite cold here in downtown Burra Creek. (Actually there is no town of Burra Creek- it is almost all ex farming land - never great farming land and now mostly hobby farms).
Already the nighttime temps are dropping below freezing outside and we have had cold enough weather to kill off the tomato plants which were growing in the dirt garden.
I had always intended to insulate the grow beds as they are above ground in the big shed and as the air temperature there is now dropping to as low as 6 or 7 degrees Celcius it is clear that the water temperatures will eventually drop as well. Current water minimums are in the 13 to 14 degree range so the tank insulation is clearly doing what it is supposed to do.
I had intended to wrap the growbeds with a product called Aircell which is a lot like heavy duty bubble wrap with a layer of heavy aluminium backed sisalation like material bonded to the bubbles. However I was quoted over $300 for a single roll which is 10 metres long by 1300mm wide. It would have been enough to wrap all the growbeds but I decided that was too much money. Instead I bought a similar sized roll of sisalation backed fibreglass batting for about $120. This was split into 3 rolls about 400mm wide and then wrapped around each growbed.
The reflective layer is fairly fragile so I then wrapped the beds with the Sisalation I took off the roof when the steel was replaced with polycarbonate.
This also had the benefit of covering over the fibreglass. This should protect the fibreglass from damage and also protect me from the batts which can cause a lot of itching.
We folded the extra Sisalation over the top lip of the growbeds . It is held to the top by a length of split 13mm poly pipe which should keep it all neat. Attaching the poly pipe was not a fun job but if it keeps the whole lot together it will have been worth the effort.
It will be very interesting to see if this part of my plan works as there will still be some heat loss from the tops of the growbeds. The next phase of the construction is the creating of a heating system for the water.
These 2 pictures were taken today. Sharp eyed viewers will notice the beans have gone from the closest growbed during the construction. Peas are the next crop to go in under the wire supports.
We have also pruned a fair bit of the tomato leaves from the plants which are still going well and with a bit of luck they will continue to produce fruit for some time yet.
2 comments:
I had a professor at Berkeley who prided himself on hi tomatoes. He had a plant espaliered along the southern side (this is the warm side in the Northern Hemisphere) of his house that grew to 18 ft one mild winter.
Are your tomatoes "full of flavour"? We get "vine-ripened" tomatoes up here in the Nareeba area but they ar usually just as tough and flavorless as the ones you get at Woolies. Hopefully you have better varieties.
Mr Smiley
Dr Smiley??
I have to admit to being very disappointed with my tomatoes.
Fairly low yield and rather watery.
I am thinking this is because they are deficient in some mineral or other and to that end I am now
adding the basalt dust (sieved crusher dust) to the grow beds to try and improve things.
I have also been using a fair bit of Seasol- both as a leaf spray and poured onto the growbeds.
Time will tell- the peas and beans and asian veggies were all really good.
I am currently loosing a couple of the Tandanus cats each week or so- clearly they can survive at 8 degrees C but they don't
thrive. The silver perch seem unaffected . Both species are really not eating anything but daphnia at the moment- subsistance rations?
Jim
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