SYNAPTOMAN

Synaptoman celebrated a birthday yesterday, and at times like this I always pause to reflect on where I find myself and how we all change over the years.  I decided that work had to go on at the Aquaponic site, so it was up early and the normal present opening ritual (”this feels like a box of chocolates, this feels like a book” etc) before leaving to fetch the staff.  It was only whilst eating my very humble lunch (a cheese and tomato sandwich and a bottle of mineral water) in the cab of my bakkie on site, that it struck me just how much I had changed over the years.

I remembered a time long ago, soon after I had qualified, when I came to the conclusion that the world owed me something and that because I was now a highly educated, intelligent and (in my opinion) good looking young man, people around me should sit up and say, “wow, he certainly has made a success of his life“.

I surrounded myself with all the trappings of my profession. Everything from the new 7-series BMW to the 3-piece suit, gold cuff-links and country club membership. I ate in only the finest restaurants and owned property and horses and sent my young children to the best private schools.

Like many before me who had achieved so much, so young, I became obsessed with my own importance. Living in Knysna, as I do now, I am surrounded by the same shallow, material people, like me those many years ago. And believe me, it’s not a pretty site.

From this position, the fall is inevitable, and when it does come, it is hard and painful.  I can only be thankful, that it came quickly and left me enough time to re-group and re-prioritize those things that make up the real ME.

Looking at that sandwich made me pause and realise what a very lucky man I have become.  People actually pay me vast sums of money to do things (I won’t even call it work) that I am passionate about, I am married to a stunning young woman (the Child Bride), who I regard as my best friend, I have children who, each in their own way, make me so very proud, and I look forward to each and every day as a challenge and a blessing.

Not being a religious person (an Atheist in fact) I still marvel at the beauty of Nature and the stunning surroundings that I work and play in every day.  And the answer is? Well?  The answer, my loyal readers, family and friends, is to let go.  Let go of all of those useless trinkets and signs of your supposed importance, and embrace what you are passionate about.  Take the plunge, your life is so short.  Everyday CAN be an adventure, you just need to find out what the important things actually are.

Go in peace.

Synaptoman

Today I officially handed over the commercial site to the client.  Everything is now installed and all the ponds, growbeds, pumps etc. are working fine.  The heat pump that we installed last week is not coping with the cold weather so we have ordered a much bigger unit which arrives tomorrow.  Once the water temperature is up to 25 degrees, I’ll order the fingerlings.

As mentioned previously, everything that we have planted in this system is growing like crazy including all the seeds sowed directly into the gravel.

We are planning a “greenhouse-wetting” party that will have to come after the Knysna Oyster Festival which hits us from this weekend, with non-stop parties.

In closing, a photograph of the completed system and some little tomato seedlings popping out of the gravel.

I will post some follow-up images in a month or two from this site, but for now we will be concentrating on the two tunnel site at Gouna.

I have numerous enquiries for similar systems from all over South Africa, so the future looks really interesting.

Cheers for now.

Synaptoman

How come things are never where we want them to be?  Take people as an example.  Are we ever happy where we are?  Of course not, so we buy cars, bikes, airline tickets to go somewhere else.  And what do we do when we get there?  Yep, you guessed it, we just come straight back home again.

Now where, you may ask, am I going with this line of thought, and what does it have to do with Aquaponics?  I’m not sure if you remember some of my posts from last Summer, but at that time my major headache was the heat, with temperatures in my home greenhouse hitting 40 degrees plus.  At this air temperature, the water was hitting 35 degrees !!

Now we are faced with the opposite problem.  Outside ambient temperatures are as low as 6 degrees.  Inside the greenhouses I am currently working with, the air temperature is about 12 degrees at night and the water temperature is as low as 16 degrees.  At this temperature the poor Tilapia are hardly eating and certainly not growing.  The Koi out at the commercial site seem quite happy as do the goldfish in the outside pond.

So what is the answer?

Well there are two things we can do.  Firstly, only grow Tilapia during the warmer months and during the Winter months move over to a cold water species like trout.  This is all very well in theory, but then you have only say 6 months of warm and 6 months of cold water, and 6 months is certainly not enough to grow either Tilapia or Trout to  decent size.

Secondly, we can heat the water.  Problems here are firstly the high capital cost of a heat pump and secondly the cost of electricity.

Last week we bought a 5.3KW heat pump for the commercial tunnel but so far it seems a it small and the best we can get the temperatures to is about 20 degrees.  We used this unit because I assumed that it used about 5KW of power (ie 25 amps) but somehow I hadn’t read the manual properly and it in fact only draws about 1KW (ie. 6 amps) so we could have gone a lot bigger.  I am probably going to move this unit to my small greenhouse at home and put in a bigger unit.  This is what the heat pump looks like.

As far as plant growth is concerned, everything looks good and all of the seeds that I planted have come up despite being in the middle of winter.  We planted numerous plants as well as tomato, gem squash, butternut, chilli, asparagus and cucumber seeds.

At the new Gouna site, erection of the greenhouse frame is going well, and if it hadn’t been for the rain on Friday, we would have had them both completed.  We’ve got the construction down to an art now and we can build the whole structure without even using a ladder, just one section at a time. Some images below.

Enough for now.

Synaptoman

What has Monty Pythons “Life of Brian” from 1979 and South Africa in 2008 have in common?  Well?

I found this really interesting scene from the movie that I think is really relevant to the debate in Africa generally regarding the contribution that the dreaded “colonists” made (or did not make) to this continent.

Enjoy.

REG:

They’ve bled us white, the bastards. They’ve taken everything we had, and not just from us, from our fathers, and from our fathers’ fathers.

LORETTA:

And from our fathers’ fathers’ fathers.

REG:

Yeah.

LORETTA:

And from our fathers’ fathers’ fathers’ fathers.

REG:

Yeah. All right, Stan. Don’t labour the point. And what have they ever given us in return?!

XERXES:

The aqueduct?

REG:

What?

XERXES:

The aqueduct.

REG:

Oh. Yeah, yeah. They did give us that. Uh, that’s true. Yeah.

COMMANDO #3:

And the sanitation.

LORETTA:

Oh, yeah, the sanitation, Reg. Remember what the city used to be like?

REG:

Yeah. All right. I’ll grant you the aqueduct and the sanitation are two things that the Romans have done.

MATTHIAS:

And the roads.

REG:

Well, yeah. Obviously the roads. I mean, the roads go without saying, don’t they? But apart from the sanitation, the aqueduct, and the roads–

COMMANDO:

Irrigation.

XERXES:

Medicine.

COMMANDOS:

Huh? Heh? Huh…

COMMANDO #2:

Education.

COMMANDOS:

Ohh…

REG:

Yeah, yeah. All right. Fair enough.

COMMANDO #1:

And the wine.

COMMANDOS:

Oh, yes. Yeah…

FRANCIS:

Yeah. Yeah, that’s something we’d really miss, Reg, if the Romans left. Huh.

COMMANDO:

Public baths.

LORETTA:

And it’s safe to walk in the streets at night now, Reg.

FRANCIS:

Yeah, they certainly know how to keep order. Let’s face it. They’re the only ones who could in a place like this.

COMMANDOS:

Hehh, heh. Heh heh heh heh heh heh heh.

REG:

All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?

XERXES:

Brought peace.

REG:

Oh. Peace? Shut up!

Well? Scary hey?

In a previous post,The Child Bride runs Two Oceans I chronicled Joans Two Oceans Marathon run. In this posting we turn our attention to the big one, The Comrades.

This years Comrades Marathon was an up-run from Durban to Pietermaritzburg over a distance of just on 87km. We flew up from P.E. with the Knysna Marathon Club on Friday, with the first beers cracked at about 11:00am. From then on it was all downhill. Man, those runners can party !!

The rooming arrangements were most favourable to young Synaptoman, and I found myself sharing a room with not one, not two, but THREE hot female runners, who I duly renamed Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

Once settled in, we immediately made our way to Joe Cools on the beachfront. From 14 degrees in Knysna to a hot and sticky 28 degrees in Durban. Wow, it was just like Summer all over again.

Here is Jo (Sunday), Dirk and the Child Bride (Friday) carbo loading.

Saturday was just spent chilling and trying not to get injured or sick. ie sitting around and drinking some more to get hydrated, but first they had to register. Being The Child Brides first Comrades, this was a rather daunting task.

Here she is getting her race number.

The big day dawned and my three nervous room-mates set off for the start.

From the left, Jo (Sunday), Joan (Friday) and Lisl (Saturday) before the start.

Another scorching 28 degree day dawned and I drove the course, stopping at various points to cheer these mad girls on. Mike (Captain Courageous) took The Child Bride under his wing and held her back from running like a mad thing and not making it, and they finished in a very credible 10 hrs and 50 minutes (just ahead of Dave Edge of Sedgefield Striders) to secure an easy Bronze Medal.

Here is the jubilant pair at the finish basking in their success.

* This is a VERY rare photograph of Mike with something other than a beer in his hand. *

And then they partied.

We were eventually kicked out of the hotel bar and told to continue the party in one of the rooms, which we duly did.

Here is an interesting shot of what happens when everyone decides to buy a round when “last round” is called.

The Child Bride decided that her reward for finishing the Comrades was going to be sushi and champagne.

Here she is tucking in.

Now here’s the deal. Our rooming arrangements proved to be so successful that we (Synaptoman, Friday, Saturday and Sunday) have decided to offer a handful of generous corporate sponsors an opportunity of a lifetime. What we need next year is a private jet to Durban, a sea-facing mansion with all of the little luxuries, enough champagne to lubricate the weekend and in return we offer all the branding rights to our stay including interviews, photographs and videos. Whether my girls will get around to running is debatable, but hang, you’ll certainly get plenty of mileage.

Synaptoman with Saturday, Friday and Sunday.

Very tired.

Synaptoman

In a previous post, 20 reasons to annex Zimbabwe, I had a light-hearted look at the prospects of annexing Zimbabwe. With the recent chaotic events, both in Zimbabwe and here, this idea may not be such a bad idea after all. Outside intervention, in some form or another, is drastically needed, and who better to take the first step than the man who, in my opinion, is the main reason for this cock-up in the first place, Thabo Mbeki.

What is needed is an ultimatum to Mad Bob, giving him exactly 24 hours to call off his goons and allow a substantial SADC and UN observer and peacekeeping force into the country to ensure a free and fair presidential run-off. Failing this South Africa, being the country with the most to lose, should send a military force over Beit Bridge and take control of what is left of this poor country, to bring some relief to the traumatized populace, and allow them to freely express their preference for a new government.

Mugabe and all of his senior Zanu-PF leaders should at the same time, be arrested to face charges of gross violations of human rights and an interim government installed pending the results of the election. The Zim Dollar should be scrapped and the South African Rand installed as the only legal tender. This will provide some temporary economic relief and although the short-term effect on the Rand may be felt, the medium to long-term benefit to the sub-continent as a whole, is worth the investment.

This may seem a rather radical suggestion, but the abused population Zimbabwe is crying out for help.  Are we going to, once again, look the other way and try some more “quiet diplomacy”?

Synaptoman

With my other commercial aquaponic site progressing well and probably about 3 weeks from being completed, I thought I’d introduce my readers to my next project. I have been commissioned to design and build another aquaponic system way off of the beaten track in Gouna just outside Knysna.

At this particular site some preparatory work has been done and I have been hired to take the project further. Here are some facts;

• The site is nice and level.
• To get there is a shocking 20km gravel road. (its probably only 10k’s)
• The field in which we are building is grassed and the soil is clay.
• There is no electricity on site for construction or running the system.
• I will use a generator during the construction phase.
• The client has also ordered 2 x 600W Kestrel Wind Turbines from me, one of which is going to this site.
• The client has ordered 4 x 7m diameter (1.2m high) mesh ponds.
• The total water (excluding sump) is a massive 184 000 L.
• No thought has been given to a sump, and it will probably have to be outside.
• The client has ordered 2 x 30m greenhouse tunnels from me.
• Each tunnel will hold 2 ponds plus growbeds
• They want to grow strawberries.
• The fish will be Tilapia.
• They haven’t given much thought to pumping water around as according to them, “Tilapia don’t need much aeration.”
• No filtration has been considered.

Here is a picture of the site on Day #1. You can see the outline of two ponds.

Enjoy the ride.

Synaptoman

‘So Boet, I hear you’ve been in Japan.‘

‘Haasoh Bru, I bring greetings from the Land of the Rising Sun.‘

‘Why are you speaking so funny?‘

‘What do you mean?‘

‘Well you keep looking at your feet when you speak, And bowing.‘

‘Oh sorry man, these habits are hard to break, but hang it’s good to be home.‘

‘So? Tell us about your trip.‘

‘Ja OK. Remember I told you I was going to look for business opportunities?‘

‘Yes, and did you find any?‘

‘Yep, bought a franchise. I’m going to be a millionaire within the year.‘

‘What kind of franchise? Japanese food, or what?‘

‘Naghh, something MUCH more interesting.‘

‘Well, don’t keep me in suspense man, let’s hear it.’

‘It’s a franchise called JAPANESE SEX AEROBICS.‘

‘WHAT? Does Doris know about this?‘

“Of course not you idiot. I’ll tell her all about it AFTER I’ve made my first million.’

‘Well, how does it work?‘

‘You know the Japanese are such hard workers?‘

‘Yes, and?‘

‘Well they work so hard that they don’t have time for sex.‘

‘So what? According to Doris, you don’t have time for sex because you fall asleep.‘

‘In Japan, this worries them, so this brilliant businessman came up with this idea.‘

‘Please continue.‘

‘Well you just have to find a big hall in the business district and rent it. Even a warehouse will do.‘

‘And?‘

‘Well then you schedule half hour sessions with an instructor and then the couples come in and do it.‘

‘Do what?‘

‘IT, you know, that thing. Don’t make me say it.‘

‘Boet, what are you talking about?‘

‘In their lunchtimes or whatever, 200 or 300 couples, half an hour, in and out and back to work.‘

‘Boet, you are starting to scare me, I have no idea what you are talking about.‘

‘They pay 100 bucks each, the instructor tells them what to do, undress 1 minute, foreplay 3 minutes, doing IT 25 minutes, then they run through communal showers and dress and straight back to work.‘

‘You mean like synchronised?‘

‘Yes, that’s it, you’ve got it.‘

‘And you PAID for this franchise?‘

‘It’s big in Japan !!‘

‘And you think it’ll work here?‘

‘Well don’t you? Here’s a picture, judge for yourself.‘

We had a very interesting week at the commercial site. We have now finished 50% of the growbeds, filled them with gravel and planted some test plants. A summary of the system as it stands now may be in order.

There are two halves of the greenhouse which I am calling A and B. We have just completed the growbeds in section A and they are numbered A1 through to A12. The other side will be B1 to B12.

There are 4 fish ponds of 7800L each. They are P1, P2, P3 and P4. All the ponds are full of water.

P1 and P2 have no fish in them.

P3 has 16 very large Koi fish which are our test fish and will come out once the system is cycling. I’d estimate their biomass at 64Kg ie they weigh 4Kg each.

P4 has about 120 Tilapia fingerlings and some mosquito fish. They will also be moved to the dam when the system is fully cycled and the new fingerlings are introduced.

Then we have the 5000L sump which I will refer to as S. All water starts and ends in the sump.

Pond P1 flows by gravity to irrigate growbeds A1 to A6.

Pond P2 to A7 to A12.

Pond P3 to B7 to B12.

Pond P4 to B1 to B6.

There are two pumps, lets call them U1 and U2. They are on 1 hour on and 2 hour off cycles.

U1 pumps water from the sump to ponds P1 and P4, thus irrigating growbeds A1 to A6 and B1 to B6.

U1 pumps water from the sump to ponds P2 abd P3, thus irrigating growbeds A7 to A12 and B7 to B12.

I battled a bit to get sufficient flow to my grow beds because my drains at the bottom of my tanks are 80mm, it then flows to the growbeds with 50mm pipes and then reduces again to 20mm pipe for the spraybars. I overcome this by splitting the flow in 3 directions using 50mm pipes and THEN reducing to 20mm at the last minute. This provides enough pressure to the spraybars now.

We planted some test plants, strawberries, lettuce, rocket, chillis, watercress, mint and then various seeds directly into the gravel. We are going to try mushrooms in hessian sacks under the griowbeds. We will probably have to shade them a bit.

As far as heating the water, I have decided to rely on a very low-tech method. We are digging a 25m trench about 500mm wide and 1m deep along the one length of the greenhouse. I am running 40mm black pipe up and down this trench from my bypass line. We are filling this trench with sawdust. Water and dew will flow down the greenhouse and keep this trench damp. The composting of this sawdust (of which we have an unlimited supply) will heat the water up. We can control this heat by using a valve inside the greenhouse to regulate how much of this heated water goes into our system.

I have also introduced nitrifying bacteria from my home system directly into the completed growbeds. This can save up to 8 weeks waiting for the bacteria to establish itself naturally.

Some images below;

Half of the growbeds are now completed.

All of the water begins and ends in the sump (sorry about the blurry image).

Jaws, one of the monster Koi.

Some of the test plants introduced.

Enough for now.

Synaptoman

The first law of thermodynamics states that, “energy can not be created or destroyed, it can only be changed from one form to another.“

As we sit in the midst of an energy crisis with Eskom not coping and global oil prices sky rocketing, I find it so strange that so much energy is wasted. We actually design systems (believe it or not) to soak up excess energy and dissipate it. What rubbish you may say, but let me give you some examples.

Have you ever been to a gym and seen all those panting people running on treadmills, cycling, working out with weights? All of them are converting one form of energy into another. A treadmill is designed to offer various levels of resistance to simulate various running conditions.

A simple generator built into the treadmill could offer the same resistance required and at the same time generate energy in the form of electricity which could be stored and used to reduce the gyms reliance on Eskom and save valuable carbon emissions.

Everytime I read about protest marches, I think what a waste of energy. Why not install a sort of travelator at each towns city hall and whenever protestors had any grievances they could all get on and walk, toyi-toy or run for an hour or two and then pop their stupid memorandum into a convenient built-in slot?

All the energy harvested could be fed into the local electricity grid.

There are already hamster wheel powered cellphone chargers, why don’t we harvest all of our excess energy.

Here’s an exercise. For the next week keep a look out for any activity that uses energy and then dissipates it by weight, gravity, springs etc. and think of how it could be converted to useable energy. And before anyone suggest using all the hot air that Synaptoman generates, I’ve already thought of that.

Be good.

Synaptoman