Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I plan on doing that in about three weeks time, have been invited to a bonfire party at Uraidla and the people that live there love trout...

Well I ate three trout back at the start of september. Just as well cos all but two died last night

I think it was temp/DO but I don't have a thermometer or a DO meter, so I can't learn much from it.

Bummer Steem... how many, and how big??

Guys,
I found I have to have another pump recirculating water and making plenty of oxygenated water flow.( small onga pump going all day and at intervals during the night)
It seems that as the trout get bigger the small air pumps are no where near enough to keep their DO up to what they need to survive.
It appears that this also lets them tolerate higher water temps.

+1 Eagle... I recently double my aeration into my trout tank... the test will come this weekend when predicted temps reach 30+ for about 4 days...

+ 1 temps here 28 atm trout 19 so good so far

I had around 170 fish, average maybe 200g
3500L of FT, 2500L growbeds flooding 13 times a day

fish tank in shed, growbeds in greenhouse

One of my airstones had floated up (not weighted down well enough) and the growbeds aren't flooded very often during the night.

Lessons

• I have a sort-of-dwc bed for aquatic plants, fed with unfiltered FT water to build up crud for lotus etc - watercress (eastern bloc and normal) LOVE this setup. However I fed it with a small pump via 19mm black poly at low flow rate (most goes straight back to the FT for aeration). This has clogged up after about 6 months.
• Use a timer when topping up system. No fish like a massive water change, and I hate losing rainwater.
• Bigger sump would allow more frequent/longer flood cycles - at the moment I have to be careful not to overflow the beds all at once because the sump will flood.
• Get a thermometer stupid
• Babacos grow really tall - need to either cut it off or cut a hole in the roof of the GH. They also attract ants and scale insects (but not aphids)
• learn your lesson from the babaco and don't plant a banana

Great stuff. I think I'm going to give your water plant setup a red hot go. It can double as a settling tank for me.

Have you got any photo's of your water bed?

Page 76 has some. It's just a large growbed with a solid standpipe (holes at the top only) and a trickle inflow.

Kangkong, watercress, lotus, waterchestnut and flag iris (in pots), nardoo, duckweed...I've got a couple of goldies in there somewhere to keep the mozzies under control (doesn't work when the whole thing is clogged with watercress)

Hi folks, sadly I'm going to need to remove my system. I have a baby who’s just started walking, so redback havens and buried blue barrels full of water aren’t really a good idea, plus I don’t think I have the time to maintain it well enough to run it properly.

Since my last post I've only had the heart to have a few goldfish in there.

So, if anyone in the Adelaide region is interested in any of the system let me know...can I say that here or do I need to be in buy/sell/swap/trade?

A few lessons learnt:

- I have a habanero chilli bush that is now over 5 years old and has thrived in all conditions except extreme wet or dry, and very low nutrients (over a year with no fish). Really really hot and amazing yield.
- Do not grow fig trees in AP unless you really really like fig roots (grown from seed by accident)
- Do not grow Yugoslavian watercress in water unless you really like it, and don’t want anything else in the water (except mozzies)
- Growbeds really don’t need much water once established properly – a flood and drain once a week in cold weather is enough to keep plants happy, once a day in hot weather and they’re generally fine (I’m talking 40°C and over in a greenhouse)
- Don’t put a system in the shade. Access to light is the key and the bigger the tree over the greenhouse has got, the more trouble I’ve had with unhappy plants.
- Rats and possums love spinach. I don’t think I ever ate any. Spinach that is. I didn't eat any rats or possums either.

Sad to see you finish up Steem, but I too understand how life gets in the way.

For anyone interested in growing bananas in AP, this is the root structure after about 5 years of growth. There was a big trunk less than 6 inches from the standpipe with no dramas with clogging or roots wrapping around it.

Come on Steem, thats just teasing., where's the picture?

Sorry, photos too big - must try again!