Backyard Aquaponics
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some lettuce planted on the 2nd


a predator

a few overview shots, looking east towards the window, the 55 gallon tank has lots of baby crays, a few 1"ers and a few 2"+ breeders;, to the left of that tank is a rack with 2 20gallon tanks, each with one marmokreb

the single tote system, i have a few options for lights on this one, still deciding what to do

the 55 gallon tank to the immediate left has the 5 fingerling blue tilapia, and my first marmokreb, 2 more 55 gallon tanks and 1 40 long on the bottom all with marmokrebs

An Amazing setup Keith.

Cool update like the pictures a lot. You have lots of interesting things going on in there. I think you could have a lot more plant growth if you can pump water out to the yard and have some beds or troughs or whatnot out there. The sun is free ;I hated buying and then paying for grow lights when I was in the basement.

My vote FWIW would be to do yellow perch and trout with no heating for the Winter. Keep the tilapia around in an aquarium though, I wish I had saved some of mine.

before i finished building the bigger system, i got a pump for myself for my birthday, it was plenty powerful enough to pump to a few growbeds outside, but i ended up returning it for a smaller pump because it drained my sump to fast, and i don't have enough room for a bigger sump..
i might use the single tote system to overwinter tilapia, and only heat it.. depends on if i can find trout close enough this fall, if not, i'll do yellow perch and a few bluegill again and button up the basement better for the tilapia

found 2 berried marmokrebs last night.. most of the last hatch has been fed to the fish, but i left quite a few to grow out..
finally got lighting on the single tote system, and will be planting it out this weekend hopefully

busy day,, planned to harvest 30ish tilapia, but after catching 15 i was done.. gotta devise a better solution!
I brought them up the street to a bait shop that cleans fish, it was quite the spectacle having tilapia..
i brought home 10lbs of fillets, with tilapia being between 30 and 35% meat, it must have been close to 30lbs.. i broke it up into 4 packs of about 2.5lbs each, froze three in ziploc baggies, just covered with water
tonight i smoked some (after brining in sugar and salt water) with tea, maple, alder and cherry, and on the fillets, a little salt, pepper, sumac flower, and a slice of lemon..
managed to take a couple pics

hopefully i'll be able to get started on my rdf today, but i still have to figure out what to do about a "funnel" in the barrel for draining..
one thing that suprised me was that there were only 7 crayfish in the pool, so even the bigger 3" crayfish are being eaten by the yp.. i put at least 40 in that were 3" or bigger thinking they'd grow out, as well as several hundred in the 1/2" to 2" range that i expected to be eaten pretty quickly.. now i'm thinking i'll just grow them out in my glass tanks and sumps, and continue to feed small ones to the pool
i'm going to investigate the clove oil for the next harvest..

harvested 15 fish yesterday afternoon, 13 tilapia and 2 yellow perch, went to take a pic and the camera was dead, and no batteries in the house.. it was a little easier using 2 nets than the crowding net by myself..
i scaled them, removed the head and fins, and froze 4 bags for dinners, and set 3 bags aside for family.. had a nice baked tilapia for dinner last night, stuffed with basil and dill from the basement, a lemon wedge, and a little salt, pepper and a pat of butter.. the fish is so mild it soaks up the flavors,, almost "perfumey"
i still have a lot of fish to harvest, but the tilapia were getting big and pushing the limits of my system
and then it will be restocking time, still undecided on next species

when i was lighting everything up this morning i found 7 or 8 baby tilapia in the sump.. harvesting them must have scared them into reproducing! lol

What is that your placing on the hydroton to sprout those seedlings? It looks like dirt, I thought that was a no no??

i was using a little bit of peat from planting plugs.. but stopped doing that

Wow!! Now that's what I'm talking about!! So I have hope lol What an amazing system Keith!! I have a bit more practice to do with my mini system before I'm confident enough to raise that many fish and vegetables but I got some great ideas brewing now. Thanks!! Look forward to more harvesting news throughout the winter.

Nice haul Keith!



What are your choices - Yellow Perch, Tilapia, Bluegill..?