Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

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Weve got to start thinking about this soon too. we are looking at possibly using EB's 1000Ltr round water tanks, and Im wonding how many Redlcaw "should" you put in one, not how many "can you put in there...

The redclaw in my tank are all rather placid, crawling over one-another - all that is except for one big fella who chases them all away from his hidey hole...
I would love to get more to see how dense I can stock them as I not only want to stock an entire tank with them but I want to monitor to see if they bother breeding when densely packed... no matter how dense the stocking level I would still not confine them to boxes..
I want to use old shadecloth combined with PVC pipe myself as homes for the redclaw as it would also make for many smaller homes for baby redclaws...

OK,
Here are 3 pictures to just give you something to think about. I will have to post explanations and details a bit later.

I will note though that the systems this guy uses (which I will be doing in the future a slightly different version of) are fairly large. This is with good reason, and when the reasons are understood, you will see how if/how it will affect your desired set up. I am convinced that you should be able to do FAR better than is normally quoted and still not have to "lock up" the animals.

The pictures show a horizontal lay out of the netting, as opposed to the verticle someone else posted a pic. of earlier in the thread. This is is also for VERY good and productive reasons.

If you are keeping good water quality, noting that most crustacians prefer slightly higher ph, then this will be a nice clean set up. This guys set up is beautifully clean. (FYI, he is using gravel to filter his water, cheap and efficient, no AP though)

Don't worry, your system will not have to be as large as his to be productive, however, I will explain on the next post (maybe later today or tomorrow) why his is designed this way and why it works best as well as the changes that could be adopted as still be productive.

By the way, none of his system, which spans several large buildings, has any water pumps. It is all run from 2 regenerative blowers, the second of which is simply a back up.
Mathew
(Thanks for the help all on the posting of the pics., lets see how well I learned)

Jezz... sometimes you just need to see it done so simple to realize how simply it can be done..... DOH......

Great info Mathew, keep it coming.

I know there are plenty of people here who are seriously considering doing numbers of redclaw or even marron and yabbies on a larger scale than most of us have tried previously

Mathew,
Thanks for sharing those pics, it is a very nice design. And now I'm really curious about how he's running his whole system with a regenerative blower and what type of densities he's running at. Oh, so many questions.

I WILL respond!

Please give me the weekend. I am trying to get everything ready for when my gravel shows up Monday morning. 4587 liters of it. I have a lot of work to do.

Meanwhile, please post all the questions you can think of (as orderly as possible) and I will do my best to answer them all.

Mathew

Nice!
I found a guy who makes these in the USA http://www.bluecrayfish.com/crayfish_condos.htm

Yeah, that's CrayfishBob. He does great acrylic work. They are perfect for someone breeding for the aquarium trade. Or someone who just wants to keep their crays seperate. BUT, his condos are on the small side for aussie crays.

Not really practical from a farming perspective.

Wow they would be great for bettas/siamese fighters

have you seen this thread?
Those condos are prob more than halfway there to this sort of thing

http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum ... sc&start=0

Aha! Found the pictures. One of the things I did was use rolls of gutter guard ( made a loose circle with gutter guard, and ziptied ends together.

You can see a few baby crays clinging on to it.




Hollow logs are great too for the bigger guys



and tons of small bits of PVC scattered around, irrigation hose ends, and bends are great as well, even chopped up garden hose is good.

I love the gutter guard, as for logs, be very careful putting wood into your tanks. I've known people who have had real problems with contamination from driftwood. I personally err on the side of caution whenever possible.

The good old gutter guard - needs to be a permanent fixture in the AP tool kit

UT, are you interested in attending the Aqua shop meet, want to meet up with you and find out who was the mongrel who stole your user name