Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

This is my first go at setting up an AP system.
It seems to work okay.

This is my first go at setting up an AP system.
It seems to work okay.

Hi Jono.... welcome to the forum.... can't see any reason for it not to work.....

So when are you building your next one??

by the way .... I'm assuming an autosiphon on the right hand end and pump output to the left..... so what does the middle hose outlet do??

sorry Jono, in cleaning up the multiple posts I seem to have lost the last photo would you repost that one

by the way the system looks good

The middle one is a ball valve that returns supply water to the fishtank for airation and to slow down the filling of the growbed.

Nice neat and simple system Jono.... You must have been doing a bit of research on the forum..

Have you got goldies in the bathtub?

Please excuse my very poor computer skills. Here's some more photos(I hope).
There is about seven Goldfish in the bathtub, 70mm to 90mm.
It took two days to build and establish this system, but the two days were about two months apart.
It cost nothing (directly) to make- I had a pump lying around and some PVC, got the tub from a farmer for free....

Snuck an extra half the system in on us Jono....

Like the idea of the mid/bottom return.... guessing that means you are running continously without a timer....

Is that gravel or clay balls inside the PVC pipes??

Ive posted a photo (that I didnt mean to) showing a HYDROPONIC system, on the right hand side, AQUAPONIC system on the left.
I built the HYDRO one day coz the idea popped into my head (and I had some PVC lying around) Then I started THINKING about it....y'know, filling up a drum with the hose, adding man-made chemicals,..chucking it out every two weeks.
Then I noticed my gutter/downpipe right next to it and started thinking about gravity feeding rainwater to it etc. etc. etc. Aquqponics was the result of my research.
The pump in this AP system runs continously.
The grow bed has 20mm gravel in it, which I "found" (I think the council called it 'blue metal')

One more photo of the auto-syphon 'dumping'

very nice. and simple!

did the water turn green before you covered it with shade cloth?

how long has the system been running for?

It's been running about a month with plants in it, and it's had fish living in it for about three months.
The appearance became green after a few days or maybe a week or so when 'green stuff' grew on the inside, below water level. The water itself was reasonably clear, but the whole thing started to look dark after I put gravel in the bottom (thinking I will use the gravel later to create a vertical PVC strawberry stack in the auto syphon line and by then it may have bacteria already on it).

I cant really remember when the shade cloth covering went on,..well, I know it was after finding the first cane toad swimming around!!!
But yeah, the water turned green before the shade cloth.
Is green water bad?

its usually a natural progression once the water has nutrients in it from the fish that algae grows, usually magically dissapears one day as long as the tub is not in FULL SUN.

You know we'll expect side by side comparisons to the hydro setup?

Steve