Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hey Mr. Bill, when the new AP setup is in, what is going to keep it from flooding like that again, a sump pump or drain pipes? Is the water from the surface or does it come up from the ground too?

The AP area is at the top of a gentle slope with the woods pasture road right next to the fish tank area. On the other side of the road the ground eases downhill about 6 feet into the bottom land. When the trenching machine breaks ground for my water/power/data from the house to the greenhouse area, I'll have it work a drain trench as well. Have some 4 inch drainage pipe that will be buried from the fish tank area, across the road, and down part of the hill. Was thinking of burying some sort of tank where the drain stops, but it might be too much trouble. Have to watch that I don't try to do too much, as in too many projects all going at the same time. Can always come back to that project later. Hate to waste water, even if it only happens during a heavy rain.

There is heavy red clay where we are so when it rains and it fills up that area I dug out, it takes about a week to dry up. Needed to dig it down that far so I could put a drain pipe in, put the tanks up on blocks, and put a layer of gravel or something in there to keep my tanks from popping out of the ground. Gotta work with what you have. This is a pay-as-you-go project.

A few days ago, a couple stopped by the house to take a look at the goat herd. The gent caught sight of what is left of my AP system and that was all it took. He let his wife look at the goats and we talked about aquaponics the rest of his visit. I gave him my info, email address and the BYAP web address.

Today, he came back with a pickup truck and a goat trailer, and his neighbor with a pickup truck and trailer. the neighbor had his truck full of gravel. We had cut a deal where he would trade a load of gravel for one of my spare tanks and a couple of blue barrels.

Its worth it to me since I don't have a truck and it would take me quite a while to offload gravel. Besides, he is on his way to getting an AP system. We'll be able to help each other out. He left here with both trucks full of good compost dirt, the 300 gallon tank, a few blue barrels, three goats, and two loaves of fresh bread.

Spreading the AP addiction.

The rebirth of the barter economy is upon us.

very cool Mr Bill

Thats a storry to love Bill!

This is a story I will use to get my kids to sleep at night Bill - if it doesnt work for them I will get the missus to read it to me so I can sleep till she works out what to do with the kids.....

p.s. dont tell her I said that....

I'll try to make it more exciting next time. Kinda hard on the thumbs though. Laying in bed with the smartphone up in the air typing in a post to my thread, makes it hard to put every fun detail into the story.

Just a tad bit more exciting this time... Trenching for power, water, and data took place this week (Maybe I should title this "What I Did On My Spring Vacation").

Had to remove some tree stumps to make way for the trencher machine.




And as you can see, a bit more exciting when the front end of the tractor comes completely off the ground...

For those of you that want to bury your tanks in the ground, I might suggest doing a search on this forum for floating fish tanks or something similar. Probably wouldn't have thought of that unless I had been haunting this forum picking up tidbits of information. So thanks to those that post their HSM's as well as posting the good stuff.

Hopefully trenching and installing a 4" pipe will keep the rainwater drained off and keep the tanks from popping out of the ground.

Now the part that I have been waiting for for almost a year, saving my money, selling stuff on EBay, scrounging, and the hardest part: waiting.

Used up a weeks worth of vacation time to have this trenching done for power and water lines to be ran to the future AP/Greenhouse/dirt garden bed area.

I also had him cut a trench to bury a fiber optical cable, some direct bury coaxial, and some data lines. It is necessary to keep the data and power separated due to EMI or ElectroMagnetic Interference.

And when he finished that part and was looking around for work to do, I had him run a trench down the end of the dirt garden raised beds so I could put a hosepipe connection at the end of each raised bed. Makes life much easier than having to drag around a garden hose to water the garden with.

And then comes the hard part... laying the wire, fitting the pipe, backfilling, marking the trenches with marking tape (that part isn't so hard), finishing the backfill, spreading grass seed, etc...

At least my boy had a good time helping.





I'll do a bit at a time. No rush on this. Just happy to finally have the trenches dug. More updates as the job progresses.

looking nice Mr. Bill