Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

G'day all,

long time lurker, havent posted in a while but been gleaning as much info as I can while plans at home remained in a state of flux.

Recently had a new shed put in, and have a nice little space between the shed and the fence that I'm planning a system for - hence the squeezy system!!

Area in total measures about 8m x 1.5 metres at the narrowest. I managed to score a 1200L rectangular pond as a sump, which i intend to half bury, leading to two seperate IBC's as fish tanks to run barra. I'm thinking two IBC tanks so that i can run differing sizes of fish independantly of each other.

Between the tanks I'm looking at dropping in a swirl filter/ RFF made from a blue barrel, with the conical base coming from a donor pool filter housing - picked it up for free from a local pool cleaning business as they were going to throw it. Was going to use it for a wicking pot, but held off with the plants to halve it and create a sloped base for a filter.

From the filter, the water will run to a group of 4 IBC grow beds along the length of the shed wall before dropping back into the sump via an external siphon set up.

Have considered the effect of reflected sunlight from the shed but its actually pretty good in there, refracted sunlight from the neighbours shed and then from ours, so i think it will be okay - if its too much, the neighbours have given me the nod to string light shade mesh up between the two sheds.

I've got a small system running at the moment (IBC tank, 1 grow bed, double IBC sump with 5 barra in it about 18cm length) so plan on using the water and gravel from that system to kick start the new one.

Total system volume should be about 3,500L. I have additional space that extra grow beds can go in in front of the shed, but might tackle that as a seperate stage

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Still planning and refining the system before work on the ground commences, got the two fish tanks, blue barrel, sump and a few odds and sods sorted, but looking at a pump and trying to figure out which one will best suit my needs and fit within the budget.

Found this one from Jebao on fleabay - price seems okay and i like the ability to change output
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Jebao-DC-500 ... Swr7ZW4OgH

Has anyone used one, or any feedback on them? Cant find much online and not sure if its because they are newish to the market.

Also looking at stocking rates for my proposed system - was thinking along the lnes of 20 barra per tank, for 40 barra in total. The four media beds will have about 150 litres of AP gravel (same most of us use up here) for a total of 600 litres of media. Is my stocking too heavy? Too light? Any feedback would be great.

Also looking at somehow linking an additional 200 litre tank (likely sitting on top of the fish tanks) to drop some redclaw in. Have them in plagues at the moment with our wet season having kicked off, and i reckon they're a pretty cool critter! Saw a similar concept not long ago on FB where the dude had a short bell siphon to drop half the water back into the sump every 15 minutes or so - imagine it would aid with O2 and water turnover. I'm thinking that a constant height in the redclaw tank, overflowing through either an NFT or 90mm PVC pipe with little pots in it for lettuces back to the sump etc might work

Have to say, finding AP is becoming quite an obsession!

HaHa, hooked ...we got another one folks

Hahaha happens a bit i reckon!

Made some good progress over the last few days, site is largely cleared but still have three wicking beds to dismantle and move. Levelled off the area and srated putting some pavers in for the system to sit on to keep the weeds down and make it harder for the ants to get in to the system.

Finally got around to doing some measurements, unfortunately i need to drop one of the grow beds, so system will be two tanks and three grow beds, but will add in some sort of NFT/ 90mm pipe and some dutch buckets for tomatoes.

Had the week at home looking after my partner following surgery, she's been kind enough to let me stay out of her way in the yard lol

Cleared out the old wicking beds as much as i could, put road base down and some bricks for the two IBC fish tanks and the barrel RFF to sit on, and got the hole dug for the sump. Digging was fun, we got 125mm of rain overnight, needed to run a sludge pump to keep the hole from filling up!

Pics coming soon

Pics or it didn't happen mate !!!

you two should meet up..

Been constantly heckling each other via FB. Its what us Darwinites do lol...

This is what i started with. A very neglected and overgrown wicking bed set up.




Area semi-cleaned out, road base down and pavers for the tanks and RFF to sit on done.




Hole for the sump half way there

Finished digging in the sump, which sits 4" pound of the surrounding area to stop run-off flowing into it



Sump in and one tank frame in place to drop in an IBC.

I lived in Darwin for 6 years... wish I still did! I regret not getting in to aquaponics while there. Would love to be able to give barra a try. I have a mate who's trying them out down here in Northern NSW... but he's going to have to get an extra job to pay his power bill in winter.

Anyway, I reckon your system will be a ripper.. but you might be a bit overstocked with your proposed numbers above.

600 L of media is probably only a bit over 500 L of wet media. Rule of thumb is one fish you plan to grow to plate size per 20 - 30 L of wet media. I imagine that the same holds for barra. But those numbers are a bit rubbery... and you can start out with extra fingerlings in case of losses... or give the excess away when they get bigger.

Cheers Dave, i was figuring in some mortalities in the fingerlings, but i definitely take on board what you're saying. Based on three grow beds at 500l total wet media, am i better off running a total of 25 fish? Will be adding more grow beds down the track but that figure should get things ticking over.

20 sounds about right to start with

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got some more done over the weekend, IBC tanks and the RFF blue barrel are in and plumbed together and leak tested - all good so far with no water loss.

Looking at sourcing a 5000lph pump - opted away from the one mentioned above as its not submersible, so any recommendations for a cost effective reliable pump would be gratefully received!