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  1. #21
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    Re: How to feed duckweed

    if your ft water is flowing through the duckweed tank, you may have too much flow..
    i ended up taking one of those small plastic yard ponds, and setting it next to my main system, i used the ft water to fill it and put the duckweed in it.. at first i had an airstone in the duckweed tank, as well as a couple minnows and a single crayfish..i also put the wife's pond lilly in it....after about a week i thought it wasn't really doing much, so i removed the airstone and put it back in the ft.. thats when the duckweed growth really took off..
    it was in the shade most of the day, and got maybe 3 hours of direct light..
    so my experience showed me that it really prefers "still" water.. i have compromised and put air in my tanks (via sponge filters) because of the livestock, but try to tune them fairly low..

  2. #22
    Members bsfman's Avatar
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    Re: How to feed duckweed

    Quote Originally Posted by keith_r
    if your ft water is flowing through the duckweed tank, you may have too much flow..
    i ended up taking one of those small plastic yard ponds, and setting it next to my main system, i used the ft water to fill it and put the duckweed in it
    I agree, Keith. My duckweed wading pool was originally filled with FT water, but now just gets replenished with rain water. A couple times a week, I dose it with urine. It also gets fertilized with leaves that blow in and the occasional over-ripe papaya that falls into it from the tree above. I use no aeration or circulation or other fertilizer whatsoever. I may have said before, I harvest about 1/3 of the duckweed twice a week and it stays replenished at that usage level. My duckweed pond is in full sun until about 3pm. I've seen reports that duckweed can double in 24 hours, but that may be way too optimistic for practical application. Based on my own system, doubling takes about 9 days.

  3. #23
    Members Roger L.'s Avatar
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    Re: How to feed duckweed

    I may have not been clear, I do not have my small containers in the system. One container is inside of my basement window and the other is outside of the basement window. The one outside is the one i am using the pond water in. i hope that takes off and i can harvest that to supplement the one inside as right now both are rather small trial setups. I just use fish tank water to replenish the one inside. Bsfman, do the duckweed need a high ammonia level? Or is that just a convenient place for relief?
    At what point did our government cease to be of the people, by the people, and for the people?

  4. #24
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    Re: How to feed duckweed

    duckweed does take up ammonia directly, i used the aged humonia i had from my cycling and dosed the dw tank with that - urine takes a few days before ammonia shows up

  5. #25
    Moderator urbanfarmer's Avatar
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    Re: How to feed duckweed

    Quote Originally Posted by Roger L.
    I may have not been clear, I do not have my small containers in the system. One container is inside of my basement window and the other is outside of the basement window. The one outside is the one i am using the pond water in. i hope that takes off and i can harvest that to supplement the one inside as right now both are rather small trial setups. I just use fish tank water to replenish the one inside. Bsfman, do the duckweed need a high ammonia level? Or is that just a convenient place for relief?
    Like most plants, duckweed readily uptake ammonia. Ammonia only takes 5 ATP to remove the nitrogen for nutrition whereas NO2 takes 15 ATP, this is 300% more energy. So, it's less work for the plant to take up ammonia; however, too much (because the radical free ions in the plant intra/extracellular areas cause damage) becomes toxic. FOR DUCKWEED, studies show a concentration in the water with an upper limit of about 60 ppm; however, optimal growth occurs around 10-15 ppm of N in the water. Light, temperature, and pH affect the the metabolism of the duckweed and the biochemistry of the water, but if you play with it long enough you will get a handle for what does best based on your setup.

    Let's not forget the other elements essential for plant growth. Phosphorus is important to control too.

  6. #26
    Moderator JCO's Avatar
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    Re: How to feed duckweed

    I gather and feed 3 to 5 pounds of fresh duckweed to my 60 1-1/2 yr old Japanese Koi every other day. I have been doing this now for the past 3 months as I do every year once the weather warms up enough for it to start reproducing at a rapid rate.

    They devour it like candy. Even if it were not doing them any good nutritionally or not, which I believe it is, I would do it for the shear joy of watching them devour it.

    I can't see why anyone would ever want to dry it before feeding....fresh is always better...feeding live brine shrimp is far better than freeze dried or any other way and the same with duckweed.
    JCO
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  7. #27
    Members Roger L.'s Avatar
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    Re: How to feed duckweed

    As I keep watching the fish I have found they act like children. Give them the good stuff and they ignore the veggies. My routine was to collect water samples to test and then as I finished the test and waited for my 5 minutes to evaluate I would feed the fish and then treat the water after assessing the test results. Then I read about this duckweed stuff and thought I should try to do this, so after feeding my normal feed I added some duckweed. They all came up to look but no one was really interested. I was having trouble with the growth part so I didn't have much and each time I fed I got the same response. I am still working on getting that silly plant to propagate as fast as they say it does so I can expand in production size (try small-loose small). The other day while going round 2 with the duckweed, I changed my routine. I took my water samples but before beginning the test portion I put a forkful of duckweed in the tank. Well what do you know, they will eat their veggies if served before the main course. Every time I've done this they are eating more and more. I did notice though they tend to eat all the roots and leave some of the leaves. This raised a couple of questions for you, my learned teachers. Is it a matter of size that they are not devouring the leaves? If they are only eating the roots, can I return the leaf to the duckweed tank to re-root (like the potato piece on toothpicks over the jar of water experiment in 5th grade)? Currently I remove any leftovers before I do anything the next day and just toss it.
    At what point did our government cease to be of the people, by the people, and for the people?

  8. #28
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    Re: How to feed duckweed

    Quote Originally Posted by Roger L.
    Is it a matter of size that they are not devouring the leaves?
    Possibly. What kind of fish do you have and how big are they?

    I wouldn't worry about straining out the unfinished duckweed after feeding though. They will get to it eventually and until they do, it won't hurt anything.

  9. #29
    Members Roger L.'s Avatar
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    Re: How to feed duckweed

    I am growing tilapia and they are about 1 1/2" - 2 1/2" except a few runts, they seemed to like the duckweed the most as they don't have to muscle around with the big boys as much. There are 25 tilapia and 16 guppies in 175 gallon tank.
    At what point did our government cease to be of the people, by the people, and for the people?

  10. #30
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    Re: How to feed duckweed

    smaller fish need more protein.. my tilapia didn't show much interest in duckweed until they were over 4", but they loved the scuds, crayfish, minnows and aquamax

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