Backyard Farming Forum
Bringing food production home

I've grown water chestnuts in my AP for a couple of years, but this year decided to set up a decent sized bed of them with the view to actually having some to eat from the harvest. Have set up one of my original AP sumps (probably about 1.35 metres diameter pond) with some soil, sand and chook crap mixed together as the media. I planted the corms maybe 3 weeks back and most of them now have 5 plus cms of growth above the soil. I was meant to wait until they were 10cm above the soil before I flooded, but because of the density of weeds that had come up, I have flooded a bit earlier. I'm sure it won't make any real difference in the long run.

One thing I was very suprised about was the recommended planting density of 2 corms per square metre. I couldn't help myself in planting at leat five times (maybe even 10) times more densely. Because the pond is about 40 or 45cm deep and I didn't want the plants to be shaded by the sides, I put quite a lot of the soil/poo mix in, meaning they have plenty of media to throw new corms. Hopefully they will use some of the depth.

I have leftover corms and am tempted to plant another pond out, but my next most shallow pond will require even more media to be placed in it, which I really need to fill my raised beds, so I don't know if I will bother. Will take a picture once the plants get a bit bigger and are more visible in the picture.

Hey Veebs, we planted all those ones you gave us within 1/2 m3. is out growbed going to explode?

I wouldn't think so :-). The recommended density would seem to indicate that the plants through their roots and grow culms in a fairly wide circumference of where they are planted. In Ap I had them super dense, not knowing what was recommended. My yield in AP was pretty poor as it is not really the correct growing environment. I expect my harvest in a flooded dirt situation will result in a much greater yield, but only time will tell.

we had a lot earlier in one of the "sand only" blue drum section of the main a/p. got "some" from it, but wasn't a huge amount..

The water chestnuts are growing well, with many of the plants being about 10cm above the water now. They are much healthier looking than ones I have grown in my aquaponics. I couldn't help myself and pulled one up the other day to see their growth habit. Looks like new stems are created off the main stem about 2 or 3 centimeters above the corm.from the corm. I can already see that the plants will spread quite quickly.

My only issue now is mosquitoes. I have noticed that there are literally thousands of wrigglers in the pond. I've netted some gambusia from the creek and put in the pond, but I'm not sure whether the consitions will allow them to live. I figure the water must be quite acidic with all the organic matter that makes up the soil mix, including chicken poo. 24 hours in they are still alive, so that is something. It will be a big job though for them to keep the mozzies under control - they are quite small fish at this stage. I did consider grabbing some feeder goldies to put in there, but will see how the gambusia go first. The fairly shallow depth of the water means it will heat up quite easilly, so that might also kill them.

I noticed that a disused pond that sits outside our front door does not have any wrigglers in it, but is full of duckweed. A quick google found conflicting views as to whether duckweed effectively supresses mozzies, but have put some in the water chestnut pond anyway to see if it helps. Won't know for a bit as it will take a while to grow over the pond. It should also provide some extra shade for the fish - if they survive.

A picture. Plants growing well.

How are they going now? Any luck with the mozzies too?

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Peasants

If you have a garden and a library you have everything you need.
Cicero

our Aquaponics thread
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I found that in AP the corms were small and misshapen, however in a tub like VB's, I got a real decent harvest. both similar sized tubs, they just prefered the dirt

The folliage is now thick as through the whole tub. I can now see that it would not have been necessary to plant as densely. I've not been to the garden over the last few days because of the rain. The folliage was getting a bit of a battering with the rain and wind, but I expect it will bounce back.

Mozzies were gone within a couple of days of putting the gambusia in. I must check to see that all is good as when we were having really hot days after the folliage had increased so much, I was losing heaps of water each day to expiration adn I'm hoping the fish did not die when the water was low one day.

We just got some water chestnuts the other day (thanks Faye!!), so keen to see how they go, and if they are worth the trouble!

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Peasants

If you have a garden and a library you have everything you need.
Cicero

our Aquaponics thread
https://www.facebook.com/mccarthy.park
http://www.mccarthypark.com.au

There is so much foliage on mine that the transpiration rate is phenominal. the 10 or so cm of water above the soil level is gone in only a day or so after I fill it. Luckilly it has been raining a lot here because I don't even get doen to the garden most days, let alone have the time to frig around filling the waterchestnut pond daily. With the rain also comes a lot of weight on the plants and as a result at one stage a lot of them swayed over in one direction, shading out others in the process. This may effect the harvest a bit, but I still think we will get heaps based on the amount of top growth.

ours got smothered by the other plants

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