Duckweed farming in an aquaponics system.

[glockman1980]

  I had an idea for raising wild duckweed as a secondary form of water filtration after the water has been drained from my plants.  I think the duckweed would grow quite well and would then create another "free" food for my chickens. Does anyone know if this would work or not?  I may just have to experiment for myself.....darn!  lol  Being a homebrewer also I have no aversion to experimentation.

[Masterherdsman]

Funny you should post this Johnny and I were talking about duckweed earlier today and I read that once established duckweed would double by volume daily.
If I could "farm" 100 lbs a day through summer and into fall I would never have to buy feed.
Realistically though while a nice thought at best I could only hope to supplement daily needs but I plan on doing more reading.

who knows with careful selection we might grow a super duckweed.

[glockman1980]

 ;)I suppose it really just depends on the amount of chickens we plan to feed.

[June]

It seems that people can eat duckweed too.  There are recipes for soup and pickles.  It has medicinal uses too.  All the recipes that I can find warn that it is "tough and fibrous".  Yum Yum.  And the recipe for duckweed soup calls for six cups of broccoli.  If you have good teeth, lots of spare broccoli and you are reallyhungry you might want to try it.  Let me know.
June.

[Johnny-Max]

Duck weed will be a vital part of our Self-Sufficient homestead. I plan on making a shallow pool to grow the duck weed in. I am thing about 18" deep and 40' x 20'
I will add chicken and quail manure weekly and the sunlight will keep it growing. I will add a little fertilizer to the water too. I plan on growing as much duckweed as possible to supplement feed for the chickens and Tilapia. I will have to try it and find what works and what don't.

[glockman1980]

  I might be abstaining from eating the duckweed myself, though it is interesting that you can!!  I guess if things get really bad I'll do what i have to to survive.  On the aquaponics front, I talked to a bait shop friend of mine about it and he says that the shiners that he sells for bait are INCREADIBLY dirty.  He has to change the water and filters on his holding tanks every day to keep it clean.  These fish would be considered a "bait" or "garbage" fish but if they are THAT dirty their water may better for raising duckweed in. Of course they would eat that too so you would have to have another holding tank, but if you can get them to reproduce you could have another bait to use to catch edible fish to use for your food aquaponics system.  Anyway those were a couple on my ideas from the last week. 

[Ggirl]

I once grew duckweed in an outdoor kiddie pool.  with no anything .  just threw a little in and it went crazy in the summer.  It doesn't need much.  Of course it could have been that rottweiler slobber making it grow.

[Johnny-Max]

I agree... it was the rotten slobber 

[cave dweller]

Greenhorn, if yer married, something else will be beating the heck outa you I'm sure.

[Ggirl]

I don't know a woman alive tha twould use rottweiler slobber for feminine itching.  That' just plain nasty.  But it's probably lactobacillus.  Just try a little yougurt or sauerkaraut in your diet.   

[Johnny-Max]

I picked up a few duckweed plants and put them in a barrel of water. It is still cold, but when it warms up it should take off.

[ibrewhaha]

I've heard that some strains of duckweed have much higher protein than others and it would be worth looking into once you had an operation setup that can successfully grow the weed.  I heard some estimates of over 20% protein.

I had an idea I want to share and see what you think.  I was thinking how I'd only be able to raise duckweed outdoors for half the year probably so I was wondering what I'd do for the rest of the year.  How about this.  I was thinking I should grow twice as much duckweed as I could use and dehydrate half of it each time I harvest and put that away for the colder months.  Dehydration is supposed to only reduce nutrition by 3-5% so it would be very viable if it is dehydrated fully.  It would be easy to rehydrate for Tilapia but maybe for chickens you'd want to soak it overnight or something.  Considering how expensive chicken feed is this could be a viable business idea too.  Maybe a mix of dried duckweed and Tilapia fish meal would be very useful for chickens.

Greg