Our Aquaponics systems are not doing very well. Although our plants are continuing to grow, the plants in grow bed 2 are dying and have lots of aphids. Grow bed 1 is doing much better than grow bed 2 and there are not as much aphids. The plants in grow bed 2 are much smaller & more of them are a yellow/brown color. For making laulau, I think that at this time it would be impossible to make anything out of the leaves that are in grow bed 2 because of the aphids. There is also a lot of moss around the roots of the taro plants and that is probably not helping with the aphids or the healthy growth of the plants. Over all, our system is still dying and we need to think of a new solution to the aphid infestation and decay of our leaves.

Michon and Tori

We are still having an aphid problem and we researched some solutions in trying to get rid of it. One solution is to catch ladybugs and bring it to our system because ladybugs just so happen to eat aphids. Another solution that seems to be working is by sponging the leaves and physically removing the aphids from the leaves. Aphids have taken over and destroyed most of our plants.

11/5/10 Noa and Larry Blog Update

The taro has not made much progress in terms of overall growth. However, the biological war we are waging against the aphids is at a stalemate. The taro leaves still look ravaged, but the ladybugs we have protecting our plants are constantly engaged in a dogfight with the aphids. Our efforts at this point, are focused on how to eradicate the forces that are destroying our crop. The war, wages on.

Once again, Kiana and Lindsey are the best.

We are using sponges to try and control the aphid problem. We are wiping them off. The ants seem to have disappeared and our lady bugs are missing as well. It seems like no matter how many aphids we take off the plants, we always get more.

Kiana and Ryan are the best!!!

The taro is growing at a good pace, but the aphid infestation is getting out of control. We are using Terro to get rid of the ants and it seems to be working, but the aphids don't seem to be going away. We are currently trying to catch ladybugs to put in the aquaponics system, to eat the aphids. We have caught a few, but there is no significant effect yet.

October 29 2010

Since we have been trying a new method of wiping the leaves rid of the aphids they seem to be doing a little better. You can see from the last pictures and todays picture, that the taro is not as infested.

Our taro plants are infested with aphids but, and are slowly taking all the nutrients out of the leaves. We finally found a solution for this issue, Connor brought in 4 ladybugs today and they are already starting to eat away at the aphids. We also started wiping down the aphids from the taro plants using wet sponges to take off mass amounts at a time. We also keep having to take out all of the dying leaves (from the aphids) so our leaf count is decreasing. Hopefully after our adjustments will aid the problem.

October 25 2010

Choke Aphids and plants aren't looking to well. Plants are growing but are still very infested with aphids and ants.

The plants looks a little bit better than last weeks. But still we are still seeing the lack of nutrients that the plant needs due to the bad side effects on the taro leaves (drying up, turning brown, e.t.c.). As you can see in one of the picture where there are lots of aphids and ants on the plant which are still giving us problems in keeping the plant clean and healthy enough.

Kiana and Lindsey are the Best.

The aphid problem is getting really bad. The second picture shows one of our aphid stricken leaves. We are spraying the plants with organic pesticides but we are also looking for other alternatives. The first picture shows that our plants are starting to turn yellow, brown, and are also getting splotches. The edges are affected the most. The plants are still growing though which is good.

Edited by Kiana and Lindsey

From what you can see, the taro has grown pretty erratically and some have exceeded the lights and went above it. We have a slight bug problem, but are finding solutions to control our bug problem. Plant #1 has 3 leaves and is 30 cm, plant #2 has 1 leaf and is 34 cm, plant #3 has 3 leaves and is 73 cm, plant #4 has 3 leaves and is 35 cm, and plant #5 has 3 leaves and is 25 cm.

Blog update 10/6

The taro in the grow-beds is growing at a very fast rate, increasing steadily with the number of leaves on each plant, as well as their height. There are bugs crawling around our taro, however for the most part they are harmless, only small ants. There are 5 marked plants, the 1st has 3 leaves, the second has only one, 3rd has 3 as well as the fourth, and the fifth has four.

As you can see from the pictures above our taro plants are already surpassing the lights. And we also noticed that the taro plants closer to the window are larger than the rest, and we think this is due to the greater abundance of sunlight hitting them. We are hoping to move the light up soon before it causes issues.

September 27 2010

As you can see from these pictures, the taro is growing very fast. One problem we are facing is that, on some of the plants, the leaves are curling up and dying. Since the taro is growing so fast, it is almost coming into contact with the lights, so we will have to raise the lights pretty soon. There are also some pests that came with the taro. These pests range from ants, to aphids. To get rid of the pests we are using an organic bug spray.

Throughout this week, we seen some pests on the plants but everything seems to be going alright. Not much changes, but the taro at the window side looks like its growing faster than the other ones. Probably because of the extra light from the sunlight. Overall everything is going well, hope we all could maintain this progress.

Aquaponics blog

Our Taro aquaponics system looks healthy!

Our fish are thriving and look very healthy.

Though pests were found, they caused little damage to the plants. We just planted more plants that Kalei donated to our class. Thanks alot! Before entering the soil Mr. Kaneko soaked the new taro stems in hot/warm water to kill any diseases or pests that could have potentially entered our system. This decreased the amount of bugs that would have been introduced unwillingly.

It has been about a week and a half since we planted the first taro plant. We recently just got ahold of another set of plants and plan to take out the unhealthier looking taro and replace them. There are a series of bugs and pests that we are dealing with and hope to rid all of them before they cause a significant amount of damage.

September 13, 2010

We have planted all of our taro plants in the grow-beds and installed lights to promote growth. We will be taking height measurements of the plants. A few leaves are also beginning to grow, even though we have only planted the taro a few days ago.