Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

This is what was printed on the box my tilapia came in:

I don't think so.

I decided not to put the tilapia in the greenhouse yet. When I ordered them, it had gotten downright hot in there, and they could have gone right in, no problem. But by the time the order got processed and a shipping date was set, a couple of weeks had gone by, and now we're having a cool spell, and the water is down to 65 degrees (F). I doubt they've ever been that cold before; I'd rather start them off a little warmer and let them get used to it gradually.

So I decided to put them in with Henry and the Convicts for now (my pleco-powered aquaponic aquarium). I separated out six of the bigger fingerlings, and once they were acclimated, I put them in to see what the convicts would do.

They seem to recognize that they're relatives, and so far are getting along just fine. The convicts are juveniles, but are bigger, but the tilapia aren't afraid of them, and are schooling right in with them, and are even eating a little for me.

In the meantime, while they've been getting acclimated I've set up a 10-gallon aquarium so if the convicts do get too aggressive, or if they're more aggressive toward the smaller fingerlings I haven't put in yet, I'll just pull them out and let the tilapia have the run of Henry's tank until they're ready to go out to the greenhouse.

Yay!

My tilapia are happy at 65F.

I think these will be too, eventually, but it just occurred to me suddenly when I was about to carry them out there that they've probably been in warmer conditions for their whole lives, being raised in a hatchery, and that the most stressful day of their lives so far was probably not the best time to expect them to acclimate themselves to a 20-ish decree drop in living temperatures. So instead they're in a 78-ish degree aquarium, and after they're eating good and looking happy again in there, they can make the move out to the greenhouse.

Also we're going to VA for a couple of weeks this month, and it will be one less place for my daughter to have to remember to feed things every day while we're gone.

I posted a photo of my tilapia over on my aquarium thread, since they're living in the aquarium right now. If you want to see them, you can go look there.

I need some hand-holding! I got some Maxicrop (dry form) and Azomite, because my plants are looking like they need some nutrient help, but I'm having a hard time finding info on how much people use. Any tips/hints? (I estimate I have around 450 gallons of water in the system right now; just 2 grow beds, but they're pretty stuffed with plants.) I don't have a sprayer yet, so I'm hoping it's ok to put the Maxicrop in the water for now.

Normally I'd just go get a sprayer, but I'm trying to get everything buttoned down before flying to VA to visit my son, so time's kind of in short supply right now.

Anything you spray would be the same as adding it to the fishtank as far as risk goes.

The safest thing to add is fish emulsion or seaweed extract.

Fish emulsion is called charlie carp in your world I think.

Fish emulsion will break down to ammonia then nitrites before becoming nitrates, so dont over do it.

The seaweeed (called seasol here) will provide lots of excelent trace elements, but not a lot of nitrogen as I understand it.

How much to add is something I cant comment on.

But wait for advice because it can kill your fishies if you over do it.

Looking up those products now...

I think the Maxicrop is what we have instead of Seasol. Azomite is for potassium, if I remember right. I vacuumed the big fish tank today and dumped all the goo into the greenhouse tank; homemade Charlie Carp!

I need to post photos of my piggie fish. I've been feeding them plentifully to get them to grow. A few are still not eating well, but most of them have bulging bellies.

Maxicrop makes a few different products I think. One that's a fertiliser which might not be ok. I'd get more input from someone that knows this stuff if you don't feel totally confident.

I got this one. It's called "seaweed powder," so I think I got the right thing.

My tilapia are still in the aquarium AP system, but I decided to post about them here this time instead of in the aquarium thread.

I've only lost 3 so far -- not a bad attrition rate (I started with 36). There are still a couple that don't look like they're eating well, so I may lose a few more. I'm thinking that starting them in the aquarium was a good move, though. This way they're right under my nose, and I can overfeed them like crazy and get them fattened up a little before I move them into the greenhouse system.

Here's a photo of some of the little piggies today, after I tossed in some algae from the greenhouse. MAN, they love that stuff!

I'll throw in a quick greenhouse update too, since I just happen to have taken photos of one of the growbeds almost exactly a month apart, and looking at them made me happy:



I wasn't sure how the onions would do, growing in the scoria, but I peeked at a couple today and they're at least twice as big as when I put them in, maybe 3-4 cm in diameter, so it doesn't look like it's hampering them from growing, yet.

The carrots are growing pretty slowly; I don't know how they'll turn out. I pulled out the pak choi because it all bolted, and planted some tomatoes instead. The strawberries look like they're loving it; I'm really happy with how fast they've grown!

Oh, the thing in the back left corner is a poinsettia left over from Christmas. Just an experiment. It doesn't show in today's photo, but there's also a cucumber plant back there now, that was a gift from Mrs. Tangent.

Here's grow bed #1. I didn't bother with before/after photos, because I've pulled a lot of stuff out and put new stuff in, so it's pretty different from last month's photo.

I've probably got 'WAY too much stuff in here, but I haven't had time to plumb in the third sump tank yet, which I need to do before I finish GB #3, so in the meantime I just keep squeezing stuff in to the grow beds I've already got!
This one's got lots of tomato plants...cherry tomatoes and a couple of varieties of regular tomatoes I bought. The one in the front left is a beefsteak tomato that Mrs. Tangent grew from seed. In the back right, next to the snow peas, there's also a zucchini plant she gave me. In the center is a stevia plant. I have no idea what you do with a stevia plant, other than pull leaves off of it and tell people to taste them...but I wanted to see if it would grow!

My lettuce has kind of died out on me (front left); I don't know why; it was much happier during the winter. The chives (bare section right of center) aren't doing much, either. Center front is a regrowing onion root salvaged from my kitchen scraps. There's also a baby fig tree hidden behind the stevia plant, some elephant garlic in the far back, and an avocado tree over on the left. The small tomato plants are suckers I pulled off the big ones and stuck in; they seem quite happy so far. Front right are some green onions from the grocery store; I've been snipping off the outer leaves every week or so, and chopping them up and freezing them in small batches for when I need them for cooking.

Not really AP-related, but I got some new trees!

After finding my five-variety apple tree, which my kids have dubbed "the pie tree," I started thinking it would be cool to have other multi-tasking fruit trees, too. So when I finally got a day off work, I went back to the nursery and looked around some more, and sure enough, there were others!


I've never made a plum pie, but I'm betting there's a recipe out there somewhere.

While I was at the nursery, I went to see the pond store that has recently moved in to a couple of the buildings on their property. They have portable ponds, which was something I hadn't seen before. These are the smaller ones -- they're about 3 feet high and 6 to 10 feet across. There were also some huge rectangular swimming pool-sized ones that were like 5 feet deep and probably 10' by 20' or more. I don't know how they make them strong enough to hold that much water. It would sure be a mess if a seam were to suddenly give way.


Here's what was inside the portable ponds:

I might have to build a pond.