BigTokes ~ "How-To" Of The Bio-Buckets 101

[BuzzBoy]

hey bigtoke and everyone else following this thread! im new to IC but I've been on OG for about a month.. currently working on my first grow for personal and maybe enough extra to make up for the power bill.. about 2 weeks more before flower. i just have some questions for you BT. I am 'really' interested in this bio bucket idea, but i want to start small until i get the hang of it. i was first introduced to it on reading HurtBack's thread over at OG. I am going to use 3 gallon ice cream buckets (3 of them with 6" netpots) to hold my plants, with maybe a 10-20gallon rubbermaid tote for a res. i am mostly using stuff i have found around the house or work or wherever(trying to save money ). i have a small littlegiant pump capable of roughly 200gph at 1ft and 120gph at 5ft. is this enough water movement to sustain a healthy environment for the beneficial bacterium? also, besides filling the netpots with some lavarock(its red? i think its for landscaping) can you put a little bit at the bottom of your plant buckets too? or will this create dead water spots? thanks for your help and the best of luck to everyone trying there own adventure with the biobucket system.

 

[BigToke]

BuzzBoy ~ it’s good to see that your going to try to throw something together and make a Bio-System……….ice cream buckets? Lol ~ the 6” net-pots is great ~ if you didn’t go no more than five feet away that pump should do 10 to 12 buckets easy ~ lava rocks in the bottom it not a good idea.

 

[BuzzBoy]

thanks BT you're the greatest! (or at least up there with the greatest). the ice cream containers can be easily obtained especially in a larger city with lots of restaurants and similar businesses. they almost always have extra buckets laying around and are glad to part with them, if they dont give them away they usually dont sell them for much, around here i pay 50cents a bucket which i assume is just the desposit on the container. but right now im going to do the dishes and see what i can throw together. thanks for the advice about not putting lava rocks in the bottom, i was unsure about it. Buzzboy

ps: i know it is not recommended.. but would it be possible to do a biobucket system without a PPM/pH meter?

 

[BigToke]

Without really knowing your skills in hydro that’s heard to say? But as a rule of thump ~ NO!!

 

[daltron]

your still here good....

your still here good....


Hello BT..... I am Daltron nice to met you....I am confirmed dirt farmer...well maybe not for much longer.....tried DWC about a year ago it was OK but with 8 buckets I got tired of moving water......and then trying to keep the pH and TDS right for each bucket...well that turned into a real chore

I've been studing this thread for about 8 weeks now and first off I must say thanks for all of your time info and help that you been giving everybody.....you have put a lot of work into this and I just want to make sure that you know it is appreciated......thank-you

well after all the time I have put into learning your system I must say....I think I can do this......it is time for a change anyway so we are moving out of 6x3x8 feet high grow room into a 8x8x8 grow room......walls are done.....3 20amp lines have been run and now I'm installing the A/C and ventilation.....we will be using 2kw hps and your system.......your thread explains everything very well so only a couple of starter questions for now....in a 8x8 room I was going to go for 2 rows of 4 buckets each....or should I go 3 rows of 4 or 5 buckets??....once the ladies are full grown I don't think that will leave much empty space....how many buckets would you run in a 8x8 room...or put another way on your system how much room do you have betwen each bucket and each row???

As soon as I know how many buckets I'm going to run I will starting ordering my building supplies for buckets, feed lines and drain lines.....

BigToke....THANK-YOU
daltron

 

[BigToke]

You going to be running remote or local reservoir ~ ether way, I would run 10 Bio-Buckets per-row for a total of 20 Bio-Buckets in there ~ buckets would be side-by-side just like mine

 

[rule35sub1]

Hey BT, I have a question for you...
I try to keep my ppm's at around 1000 but for some reason it keeps going up. I stopped feeding anything to the plants and it still goes up. I took into account the water being used up faster than the nutes and I just don't get it. I add fresh water and the ppm's drop back down after a couple of days they shoot way up again. The plants themselves look great. I am just curious if you have ever experienced this before? All is well otherwise. I am keeping ph between 6.1 and 6.3 until I flip to 12/12.
Water temps are around 68 to 72 degrees. Plants are thriving.

 

[BigToke]

Sup rule ~ the only way that I know of that nutrients can go up, is when your plants take-up more water then nutrients ~ thus leaving you with a higher reading of ppm’s.

My Bio-System is constantly adding fresh water to the reservoir as the plants take it up ~ thus watering down my water/nutrients in my Bio-System, as the fresh water goes in the ppm’s go down.

If memory serves me, I don’t recall you having installed a float valve in your reservoir? Did you? If not it make no deferent whether you add water by hand, trust me it needs to be on a float valve!!

 

[rule35sub1]

No float valve, have to do it all by hand. I add about a gallon of cold tap water each 1 to 2 days. I put a line in the inside of my res to see what level to fill it up to. I guess these plants are some light eaters then.

 

[BigToke]

Oh I see ~ a float valve is a must to make this system properly operate ~ maybe when this harvest is over you can install one? That would elevate a whole lot of problems.

 

[rule35sub1]

How much water must drain out before your float goes off? I am only letting a gallon of water disappear at anytime. Isn't that good enough?

 

[BigToke]

The float valve that I use is very sensitive, the slightest amount of water up-take by my plants and my float valve go off ~ as to your other question, I’m not sure about that.

 

[rule35sub1]

Well the plants are all looking well. I think they are just super light feeders, cuz they are all growing well.

 

[OldFart]

Seeds to Buckets

Seeds to Buckets

Hello BigToke!

I am setting up a small bio bucket system, 4 buckets in about a 3x3 ft area with 430W HPS, an old wet/dry filter and pump from my old tropical fish days and have a few questions of the bio bucket master.

1) The filter has a 5-gal sump, auto fill float, and returns overflow over a bunch of "bio-balls" that have lots of surface area for good bacteria and oxygen saturation. I used it in a 90-gal freshwater tank loaded with plants and fish with great success. It would hold 25 gallons to the top, but only fills to 5-gallons. The bio-balls also silence the water flow, which is highly desirable! The pump is a mag-drive Teal that is rated for about 2.5 gal/min into a 1 ft head. Any issues here?

2) My buckets are some extra heavy duty paint buckets that have a big ridge around them right where your drain fitting goes. I though about using a 1" bulkhead fitting in the bottom of the bucket and a PVC pipe that runs to the fill level. This will allow adjustment of the fill level by simply changing the length of the pipe, and removing the pipe allows the bucket to drain. Seems like this should work as good as the side drain you use.

3) I have some Top44 seeds and would like to germinate them to put in the bio-buckets. I might only get 1 or 2 females and end up with a couple buckets without plants, but I will work on clones later. You mentioned in another thread about using peat pellets to germinate the seeds. Can these go in the buckets just like the Oasis Cubes you use for cuttings? It would appear they would set on the lava rocks out of the water in the same way. How much in the way of roots out of the cube do you need to move them to the buckets? Any helpful hints here would be appreciated!

4) I understand the 1-2-3 and 3-2-1 GH nutes ratios, but am not sure of the weekly TDS schedule. I have seen from other sources that you should stay at about 1/3 to 1/2 of normal concentration for cannabis. Do you use GH's full TDS schedule, reduce it by some factor, or have your own concentrations?

Thanks in advance for any advice you might have!

OldFart, aka 50's hippy

 

[BigToke]

Sorry for the delay OldFart ~ BigToke had a death in the family and just haven’t felt like writing much lately but I’ll see if I can answer some of your questions.

It has been my experience that the bio-balls will do you little good in your hydroponics setup ~ the bio-balls maybe a good thing for a light weight fish tank but when it comes to hydro your going to need something a little more heavy weight to do the job ~ just use the lay out that is in this thread and you’ll be alright.

I would not use any paint buckets at all ~ plastic has pores and it breathes, so you can never really remove the chemicals from it.

I though about using a 1" bulkhead fitting in the bottom of the bucket and a PVC pipe that runs to the fill level.

I have no idea what your talking about right here, you must be referring to some other hydro-system of growing for the Bio-Buckets do not operate this way.

I have never used peat pellets in the Bio-Bucket, and if I did it was a typo or I was blowed away on something!!! I only use Oasis Cubes ~ I usably transfer my cutting after that I see about a half inch to an inch of roots coming out of the cubes.

Yes I do use GH, but I just start adding equal amounts of each in the same ratios until I get the system to were I want it to be ~ I do not set down and calculate on how much that the label says that I need to put in and then put that in there, if I did that I would burn my plants up.

 

[OldFart]

Thanks BigToke

Thanks BigToke

Hi BT, thanks for the reply. Sorry to hear about the death in your family, my condolences.

I wasn't very clear in a couple of my questions! On the bio balls, they are called "aqua balls" and would be similar to putting a cubic foot or so of lava rock in the return stream to your reservoir except they have far more surface area than a chunk of lava. They are not just a round ball, but a plastic molding. The water trickles down through the balls like hundreds of little water falls and is exposed to far more air than simply being dumped back into the tank. But my real question was the fact that the sump holds about 5 gallons, and is a 5 gallon reservoir enough for four five gallon bio buckets? It has an auto fill float built in, so without the balls, would be the same as any other tub with the float level set to five gallons. I have it, so it would be good to use it.

My paint buckets are new, they have not had paint or anything else in them. They are white, but I can wrap them in mylar to keep light out. Black buckets don't seem to be available anywhere around where I am. What is that stuff you wrap your buckets with? Why do you wrap them? Insulation?

As for the return water flow scheme, the return pipe is simply located inside the bucket instead of outside and goes out through a fitting in the bottom of the bucket. Think of it as sticking a pipe into your drain fitting that runs up to 1.5" from the top of the bucket. When the water level in the bucket reaches the top of the pipe, it will then run down the pipe and back to the reservoir tank, maintaining the water level at 1.5" from the top. Removing the pipe from the fitting in the bottom allows the bucket to be drained, but through the reservoir instead of a separate waste pipe, so the reservoir must have a way to drain it. Your little sheet of plastic in the side of the basket would keep roots from growing into the pipe and is a great idea. Sorry I don't have any pictures.

I want to start my seeds and when ready, move them to the bio buckets for growing, take cuttings from all of them and keep the ones from plants that turn out to be female, and use them for mother plants. Meanwhile, I get buds from the female from seed much sooner, a nice thing when you don't have any! If I want to go from seed to bucket like this, can I start them like you do and put them in the buckets without the Oasis Cube? Any ideas here would be very useful!


Thanks for your help!

OldFart

p.s. I discovered that old farts on the og forum are experienced growers, not just old in age. I might have to change my username to Old50sHippy or somthing!

 

[daltron]

Hello BT,
just a short note to say hello and give you my condolences Sorry to hear about the death in your family.

I've finished the rebuild of my new grow room and I am currently building my system following your step by step instructions.......you make it so easy...thank-you......I think from your lesson's that I understand everything....even why I am placing my buckets side by side.....after all I'm not growing trees just big buds

by the end of next month I should have water in the system......man o man I am getting really excited about this !!!

I am so glad that you took the time to explain everything in such great detail...I have found that when I understand how and why something works I get much better results......I will give you an invite to my grow thread once it gets started.....thanks for eveything......daltron

PS....BT you seem to place some good stock in good security.....I only post on one other site...hc.com.....I use the same handel [daltron] click here to read more about daltron on HC....

 

[BigToke]

OldFart ~ I’ve been running short lately I’ve had a lot on my plat so in short ~ imo stick to the lava rocks, those bio-balls are not for aware particular situation.

question was the fact that the sump holds about 5 gallons, and is a 5 gallon reservoir enough for four five gallon bio buckets?

yes ~ I would run a test before starting up a grow just to make sure that when you turn off the pump that the back-flow didn’t run over!!

What is that stuff you wrap your buckets with? Why do you wrap them? Insulation?

yes ~ so that I don’t loss my coolness so quickly in my system ~ if I were you I would wrap them.

again this whole drain stuff you got going on just spooks me out…………..I think if I were you I would just stick to what works.

I believe the best way to grow/start in the bio-buckets are to use the Oasis Cubes………….but if you have something that you what to try go for it………..


Daltron ~ thanks for the proops bro, can’t Wight to see what you’ve done…………..if I can help with any ideas let me know.

 

[OldFart]

Thanks BigToke!

Thanks BigToke!

Thanks for your help! I will report and post pictures of my results.

OldFart

 

[Guest]

Hey been reading alot on bucket systems as of lately.
Would it be of any benifit to have a extra bucket with no plants,just full of lava rock.
I am thinking this would give you massive surface area for the BB to thrive in,and more is better.Also could have the return lower in the bucket to cause more splashing adding more O2.
This biobucket type of system is very similear to a saltwater tank, with a sump and bio filter.Large volume of water flow,splasing for aeration,and a large surface media for bio colonies.
Also curious if a bucket system could be done in 2 gallon buckets?And would you reccomend an in line pump vs. a submersable?I would think an in line would avoid high temps in the rez.
Thanks Big Toke, you threads are very simple to follow,and in depth.Always great reading.