Evaluation of a nutrient film aquaponic system for growing of lettuce
Department of Agricultural and Environmental Engineering, School of Engineering and Engineering Technology, The Federal University of Technology, Akure, Nigeria.
Research Article
International Journal of Frontiers in Engineering and Technology Research, 2022, 03(02), 028–043.
Article DOI: 10.53294/ijfetr.2022.3.2.0050
Publication history:
Received on 24 September 2022; revised on 24 November 2022; accepted on 27November 2022
Abstract:
Aquaponics as a key factor in the advancement of integrated food production systems and noted potential by simultaneous combination of aquaculture and hydroponics practice. This study evaluate a nutrient film aquaponics system (NFT) for catfish and lettuce. The catfish was raised under different feeding rate treatment: 5% (TRT5%) and 3% (TRT3%). The lettuce was grown with the water from the two treatments and the convectional method (control). The observation were taken in seventh days after transplanting for 4 weeks. The effect of the treatments and water quality on the growth and yield parameters of lettuce were analyzed using analysis of variance and regression analysis at 5% significance level. The result shows that the initial weight of the stocked fish under different treatment tanks had no significant difference (P<0.05). In 3-10th weeks, TRT5% is significantly (P<0.05) higher than the TRT3%. The TRT5% significantly increased the leaf number and plant height of the lettuce by 27.38% and 28.72% respectively con. The TRT3% significantly increased the leaf number and plant height of the lettuce by 13.10% and 12.34% respectively. The developed mathematical models for number of leaf, plant height, leaf area, weight and productivity had an accuracy of93.2%, 95.6%, 99.7%, 98.28% and 83.32% respectively, Therefore, it should be adopted by small and medium scale aquaponics farmer for significant prediction on lettuce yield as a function of NFT water quality.
Keywords:
Aquaponics; Fish feeding rate; Vegetables; Water quality
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