Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi there

I have recently converted a 45,000 litre pool into a pond using a natural biofilter system. The water has settled in well and I now have a few comets and some small Australian bass living there. I now plan to grow veggies in the top of the biofilter and perhaps even add some additional grow beds.

But, unlike most posters here, my objective is to have a great well balanced pond with aquaponics as as adjunct, so my fish stocking levels are quite low as I'm not feeding the fish.

I have lived through the green water algal period and I'm now dealing with the winter blanket weed issue. I thought marron or yabbies might eat some of this green stuff and add another dimension to my back yard pond, but I'm not sure which would be best - perhaps somebody can help me here?

I know that marron leave ponds for a walk on occasions ans they would certainly be able to exit this pond very easily, so that may rule them put.

Any guidance would be appreciated.

Yabbies will do the same Stages, although they appear more tolerant of water conditions. I don't know if they will eat the weed though, more like the bacteria on it i think?

Oh and welcome buy the way

Hi Stages, Marron and Yabbies both will escape, maybe post a pic or 2 of your setup, but if you leave the water down 6 - 8 inches you should be ok, they seem to loose balance when out of water, but you can't have plants, cables etc near the edge as they will climb those, Yabbies are aggressive and will eat each other for territory but you can run more yabbies, marron are mellow in comparison, main thing is you need plenty of hides, best to make them out of 3" pvc or I used plastic pot plants with roof tiles floor and brick sides and nice rock on top (see pic attached), in a dam we stock marron in we have used old tyres but I am not a big fan of tyres, although member dbird also uses tyres for his yabbies in a 2000lt tank, I doubt if either will like the weed situation they will eat it in small quantities but if you have a lot of weed then they will probably suffocate, main thing is to keep them happy and they will stay, get marron as juveniles and they will be less likely to escape as they think it's home, for me marron are much better as they don't fight, taste better but are more harder to grow, but I would work on getting rid of your weed then maybe try marron in October after they have breed and fingerlings are plenty available

Yabby don't tend to eat floating plants - they have even left the ornamental pond grass alone in preference to rotting vegetable matter - but they are good escape artists - I have found a few scattered around our property (dead) which escaped from a 1m cube tank I was breeding them in...

I love that pic Nocky, look like they have their own little porch.

For some reason I keep thinking of the fish tank in Monty Python's, Meaning of Life.

"Morning, morning, good morning, morning "

Thanks very much for your comments - it looks like neither marron nor yabbies would be ideal in my pond, so I'll just have to stick with fish for now.

Yes gnash I could live in their my self, it would be much warmer at the moment, but sending ice your way
Stages marron would be excellent for your set up, but not to kill weed, I am a marron lover (eating that is) and you would be able to have 100 or so quite easily, but put them in as juveniles around october,

If this is an earthen pond, you could try to make the sides steeper so the weeds/grasses are less likely to grow. This is what aquaculturists do for outdoor ponds but they still have problems so it won't totally eradicate the issue. Ducks are well known to eat weeds/grasses and are known to be great aerators as well as they splash and play- commonly used in China for this purpose as well as a food source and their waste is a food source for algae. This is a nice pond so ducks, even small decorative wood ducks, may be inappropriate as they will walk on land and make a mess everywhere. Perhaps something that specifically targets your water growing grasses would be more advantageous but at the moment, I can't think of anything. Do some research on the net in regards to your particular species of grass, maybe something on what eats it/predators will come up.