Maintaining the System

First addition of water occurred today. I'm quite curious to see how well the system responds to neglect. So far, with the plants being quite small as yet, the system has required little attention. Today I topped off the liquid in the pond taking it up close to capacity adding something like 2 inches of water. Before the water was added the CF=21 and after the water was added it had fallen to about CF=17 although I didn't wait for it to gain full equilibrium. I added a half cup of blue and white Total Gro Steiner concentrate and that appeared to return the pond to nominally CF=21. I'll check tomorrow to see if that is what it is at when it reaches equilibrium.

I've not yet mixed up any new concentrate so I'm using up the last gallon of concentrate that I had from last year. I'll probably have to mix up more before long. To mix my concentrate I mix one pound of blue nutrient power into a gallon of water and then a pound of the white mix into a different gallon of water producing one gallon of blue and one gallon of white nutrient concentrate. One ounce of concentrate (both blue and white) added to a gallon of water produces a gallon of nutrient at CF=24 (roughly).

So far the plants look great and somewhat healthier than the similar plants planted in the rototilled patch (about 15'x15') in the back yard. I've added no fertilizer to the backyard patch which may contribute to the fact that they look a little more anemic and have some yellowing of the lower leaves. I'm thinking of that patch as something of a control against which to measure the progress of the little float/pond system.