Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hello all!

I'm new here, and am wanting to build my first Aquaponics system. I want to build a simple system out of half a wine barrel and a long rectangular wooden planter. My idea is to put fish in the wine barrel and have one end of the raised planter drain into the barrel.

My problem is that neither the barrel nor the planter can hold water by themselves. I need a way to seal the containers that is safe for the fish and plants I'll be eating. Does anyone have any ideas?

Thanks in advance!

A fish safe brushable pond sealer should be fine. We have a few different types in AUS, usually a modified bitumen or rubber membrane that can be brushed or rolled on (some sprayed), with or without the need for reinforcing along joins and corners (doesn't hurt to do it anyway IMO).

Some examples we have here are:

http://www.crommelin.com.au/range/at-ho ... er-colours

http://www.bondall.com/titerange/pondtite.html

http://www.clearpond.com.au/go/our-prod ... uctListing

There are many more. Basically you just want something that is fish safe and ideally potable water safe too.

You can use pond liners but I think given the size of a half wine barrel you'd end up with unsightly folds, and while you can get wine barrel liners, I think they are more expensive and probably don't fit all size barrels.

The wine barrel. providing it has its hoops, should hold water. Allowing the staves to dry gives you gaps and if the hoops aren't held in position will fall off.
Personally I would just soak it until it becomes watertight and use as is.
As for the trough I would just use black plastic, the stuff you see painting drop sheets made of and line it, there again I am cheap.

Thanks for the great ideas. I think the best choice will be to just find planter liners to fit the wooden troughs and then I'll probably need some sealant that was mentioned for the wine barrel. And the only reason for that is because the wine barrel is just from Home Depot and I don't know that I can trust it will actually hold water by itself.

Thanks for the help, I'll have to post more to show how it goes