Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi everyone,
Have not posted for a while as i was working out west and have been away from home the last 12 months. My system now consists of a 10000 ltr fish tank 12 bathtub grow beds. I have a 2500 septic tank converted to a sump that the beds drain into. A sump pump with a float switch sends the filtered water back to the fish tank. The tank has a pump on a timer that runs for 15 mins on the hour from 6 am to 6 pm. In the tank are four air stones.

The system ran all year in my absence with zero water monitoring and no maintenance. When i returned the water was reasonably clear, but i was unable to see my fish. The fish tank had not been cleaned for three years approx. The grow beds have not been cleaned coming up 6 years. I decided to drain the fish tank and gernie it. My son and i drained the tank contents onto the fruit trees in the garden. When the tank was 200mm deep we transfered the fish to a paddling pool. 15 mins so far. The fish looked stressed as a few were swimming sideways. We gurnied the tank and the fish looked even more distressed. 25 mins had elapsed. I have a 50000 ltr rainwater tank adjacent to the fishtank. We opened the 50mm valve and started filling the tank. Two dead fish both about 450 mm long. Also at the bottom of the tank were approx 150 red claw, enough to fill a twenty lire bucket. Some where tiny without shells about 30mm long. The red claw may be breeding. I kept a constant flow of water into the paddling pool from the rain tank. This was the first time i had seen my fish for three years. Their condition was very good and they were fat and without lesions or injury. When the fish tank was full i started the pump to the grow beds. In all after 2 days i had lost 8 fish in total ranging in size from 350mm to 460mm. I was really pissed off, if i had of left them alone they would have been ok. I now have only 36 silver perch left. I noticed a difference in shape between some . Some had heads that rose steeply from the n0ose almost vertical. Others were more tapered with a smaller head. I wondered if it could be the difference between males and females. After 10 days i can no longer see the fish. the water is a very light brown color. I have a stocking over the 50 mm inlet pipe and it has turned brown and trapped about a cup of sediment. looks like i am going to have to clean the growbeds. it is going to be a chore to wash all the gravel in each bed. A total of about 1.5 cubic metres. I was thinking of shoveling it into a concrete mixer to was it, the drain through a 5mm gauze tray. Has anyone cleaned a grow bed what is the best way?

Woah, that is one big wall of words.

I'm quite impressed that it ran so well without being touched over that period. Sad to see the fish go, I had the same sort of issues when I was fiddling with a pond liner. 30 murray cod gone

Throw up some pictures, everybody (and I mean myself) likes pictures!

hi everyone here is an update on my system. It has been over two years since my last update. In october 2015 i set up a 5000 lt fish tank and 12 ibc with 16mm blue metal in the grow beds. I transfered the remaining fish from my system into the school tank. They were doing fine and the veg growth in the beds was outstanding. In January contractors working at the school turned off the power to the aquaponics area. my partner and i were away for three days when we returned 25 8 year old silver perch some 500mm long were dead. To say that i was devastated was an understatement. I looked on my as my work crew they were tame and i could hand feed some individuals. I wanted to just give up and dump everything. I changed my mine and purchased 150 silvers approx 75mm long. Since then they have grown to 150 to 200 mm and we feed them twice a day. they are ravenous and the water surface comes alive as they smash the pellets. I cleaned 6 of my growbeds by shovelling the contents into a cement mixer and letting the gravel aggitate for ten minutes. The gravel comes out clean as new and the waste goes on the fruit trees. I am working in brisbane for another couple of months. The latest drama is my resun pondmate dwp280000 , this is the third one has developed a crackin the casing and has shorted out the power. I have ordered another and it arrived today. We have not had the pump going for 10 days. My partner has just been topping up the fish tank with water evry day and installed extra air stones. We have used 60000 lts of clean water to keep them alive. When my son removed the old pump he sent me pics. The red claw in the tank about 200 have eaten the insulation around the power supply to the pump but not yet exposed the wires. The last pump failed because the ate through the active wire and shorted out the pump. This time i am going to cover the power cord in flexible electrical conduit. I would like to experiment with alternative feeds for my fish The last ones became almost exclusively vegetarian and would eat massive quantities of lebanese watercress. i also tried minced road kill rabbets A very messy endeavor to nsay the least. I am a bit suss about where Ridley get there products from and when i asked them they were resistant to giving me any info. I don't particularly want to support the Gelong Star or similar. When i return home i am going to add more growbeds to cope with the increase in the fish volume. So that is my update.

hi everyone here is an update on my system. It has been over two years since my last update. In october 2015 at the local high school i set up a 5000 lt fish tank and 12 ibc with 16mm blue metal in the grow beds. I transfered the remaining fish from my home system into the school tank. They were doing fine and the veg growth in the beds was outstanding. In January contractors working at the school turned off the power to the aquaponics area. my partner and i were away for three days when we returned 25 8 year old silver perch some 500mm long were dead. To say that i was devastated was an understatement. I looked on my fish as my work crew they were tame and i could hand feed some individuals. I wanted to just give up and dump everything. I changed my mine and purchased 150 silvers approx 75mm long for my new home system. Since then they have grown to 150 to 200 mm and we feed them twice a day. they are ravenous and the water surface comes alive as they smash the pellets. I cleaned 6 of my growbeds by shovelling the contents into a cement mixer and letting the gravel aggitate for ten minutes. The gravel comes out clean as new and the waste goes on the fruit trees. I am working in brisbane for another couple of months. The latest drama is my resun pondmate dwp280000 , this is the third one has developed a crackin the casing and has shorted out the power. I have ordered another and it arrived today. We have not had the pump going for 10 days. My partner has just been topping up the fish tank with water evry day and installed extra air stones. We have used 60000 lts of clean water to keep them alive. When my son removed the old pump he sent me pics. The red claw in the tank about 200 have eaten the insulation around the power supply to the pump but not yet exposed the wires. The last pump failed because the ate through the active wire and shorted out the pump. This time i am going to cover the power cord in flexible electrical conduit. I would like to experiment with alternative feeds for my fish The last ones became almost exclusively vegetarian and would eat massive quantities of lebanese watercress. i also tried minced road kill rabbets A very messy endeavor to nsay the least. I am a bit suss about where Ridley get there products from and when i asked them they were resistant to giving me any info. I don't particularly want to support the Gelong Star or similar. When i return home i am going to add more growbeds to cope with the increase in the fish volume. So that is my update.

Thanks for the update bluefin, shame about the fish, I guess that is the biggest downfall to AP.
Glad to see you are still plugging away. Any chance of some pics???