Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I have an idea that every monday, I would start lettuce seeds, and after a while, I would have a never ending supply of lettuce. Pull one out to eat, and transplant a seedling into the system every week. And the same with tomatoes and cucumbers (probably on a longer schedule though)

Are any of you getting most or all of your vegetables year round from your system?

Do you think/know/feel that you are saving money?

Even if we're not saving money, there are worse hobbies than trying to grow healthy food.

Just some of my thoughts as I get started on my AP journey.

Thanks in advance!

Brian

I have just started researching and am learning all I can before I start up a system. Could you tell me, Knowing what you know now, would you have started your system up.

No and no.

I am growing my own food in AP and I'm pretty proud about that. Our produce does taste better than shop bought too and I'm pretty proud about that too.
Fairly sure my mates are jealous too.
When I go totally solar it'll be even better.
but first I need to;
Fix the pool, the orchard, chook run, apiary, pizza oven, shed, amphitheatre, cubby, home brew, retaining and so on.....

Agree with the skeg man.

Good fun trying, and I lose less than if I try in soil, and use bucket loads less water.

The heat here in WA just smashes everything unless you have heaps of shade mesh and plenty of water. Soil (sand) is hydrophobic, so needs heaps of work to get fertile, and keep it there.

I am mostly approaching to AP as an integrated part of my food growing system. In my integrated system, I have 55 sqm soil veg garden, 40 trees for fruits (in dirt) and the AP with 2.4 sqm GB. I also have a worm garden, homemade BSF pod and a meal worm system. I am planning to grow AP in the future too.

All these are connected. Worms consume kitchen scrap and excess azolla, duck weed. They are also food for fishes. I have worms in the GBs as well.

In the future solids from the AP will go to fruit trees.

Any uneaten, uncooked parts of the fish will go into my fish digester to become liquid fish fertilizer which used in the garden.

My bees are sucking water from the GBs, I guess they are enjoying the pristine quality water there. They also do most of the pollination.

Boiled silverbeet and spinach that I grow on soil are also fed to the Silver Perches.

BSF doesn't work yet but meal worms fed to another little 300L pond with comets in it which grows lettuces and basils. I also put cuttings of goji berries or black currants here to root them.

With the combination of things above, I don't buy much veggies and fruit. But I wouldn't rely on just AP to supply the vegetables. As we know, it is a closed system and when it fails, everything dies in it.

Also the quality of the food I/we produce is way better than supermarket. I think its a superior product nutritionally and ethically as well.

Yes we spend sh*t load on tanks, connections, fingerlings, fish food etc. but there is also mental and health benefits in it that are invisible which makes it worthwhile.

With your fruit trees in Canberra do you have a fruit fly problem

Yes, I do have fruit fly problem, especially on apples. I am using neem oil but I heard that neem oil is not good for AP and fishes. I bought some feromone traps but I don't think they work well either. I am planning to install a bug hotel to attract beneficials but I don't know what beneficials we have here. I still have some untouched apples though.

Get yourself some Cera Traps (or just buy the liquid, 1l or 5l, and make your own traps from 2l plastic juice bottles).
We catch thousands of QFF every year with Cera traps here. I also put bags over the fruit trees (pics on my web page), so we don't have any losses. If I didn't cover the cherry orchard, I'd get no fruit at all.
Side by side comparison with various other commercial and home made QFF catching methods shows Cera is orders of magnitude better.

Thanks Gunagulla. I am searching Cera Traps now.

The big B carries it, as should most Ag supply places.
The 1 l bottle is probably most useful size for a suburban block, we buy a couple of 5l bottles at a time, and I generally put out up to 50 traps around the place here. It stores ok from one year to the next if you keep the bottle sealed and out of the light.

that is pretty much the way to look at it.

>> Are any of you getting most or all of your vegetables year round from your system?
no, but getting something most of year

>> Do you think/know/feel that you are saving money?
no, I think the cost recovery aspect is a fail, but the hobby keeps you active, interested and occupied

This bloke I know gets some of his veg from AP, and the sale of some 'dolphin friendly cat food' makes enough to buy most of the rest, plus there is some bartering of fish with neighbours for other items including honey, and he has enough fish to feed himself without needing to buy any, so yes it can pay for itself, not counting capital costs. To pay them off within 10 years you'd need to go fairly large, but I think it is doable.

Hi One shot,

It's a bit of a trick question....

What I find is no matter the method of gardening, the seasons/climate dictate what we grow and in turn what we eat. It is then very hard to go to the shops and buy out of season produce that's hideously priced, had God knows what chemicals used with it and so forth.

That's when the next bug bites for a green house or ability to extend or maximise the seasons.

Possibly over thinking things - although I can't help but feel that if every abled person on the planet could grow some produce if at all possible, there's be wide spread benefits across the board.

Furthermore I think as water becomes more polluted and less available that AP system are in an ideal position to help us all out.

Making money or living off it is not my main objective. Getting away from eating polluted plants is. What we eat the most of and all like is what I will go after first to try and make a dent in the food quality we eat. And I will be trying the stagger approach also. The entire testing is set up around being able to continually grow and eat.

Right now my biggest problem is starting seeds to grow. Complete failure so far. So until I can develop a system of replacement plants I will hold off on anything large enough to rotate crops thru. Back to more seed research in AP systems.
D

its cold in china now yes?
start seeds as you would for planting in the ground, with a heat mat.

then wash off dirt and transplant