Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

OK OK.... don't jump on me for this idea.. just listen for one minute

when i was a bit younger i was running 5 aquariums at once in my room.. two 50gal, 1 40gal, and two 20gal.

one of my 50s was empty and i wanted do do a more natural tank for once.. i had a simple tank heater an air stone and a really good top tank filter, i went out in my dirt pile and got some great rocks golf ball size and smaller, and two really nice shaped larger stones, i boiled them ( to clean them ) and set up my tank.
wile thinking of what type of fish to put in the tank i had this idea to make the hole thing just fancy guppies!!! i love them cause they are so pretty and just a great hearty fish for tanks.

so i did just that i put 7 guppies in the tank 2 males 5 female, in about 2 months i was looking at a school of fish the babies could stay in the tank because of all the space in the rocks to hide and the plastic baby hide grass at the bottom, and guppies don't cannibalize there young to often, in 3 months i had so many fish swimming in the tank it was ridiculous, in JUST 5 MONTHS i had to start removing fish and putting them in my other tanks, i ended up buying another 40gal tank for my mother because she thought the guppies tank was so cool she wanted one.. THANKFULLY i got to take a large load out of my tank for her.. so after about 8 months all my tanks were full of guppies and i ran out of room... i had the tanks for a further year and a half.
my friend had an Oscar (should i go on?) he couldn't keep at the time due to him moving and not having the ability to set up a tank for a few months so i took the little guy in and decided HEY i need to get rid of some fish anyway i put the little carnivore in the guppies tank and in just four or five weeks he was a very lonely fish and 5 times the size... lol..

point is that's a lot of fish! and that's also a lot of waste!
could you possibly use the little fancy guppies in an aquaponic set up and reap the benefits of large fish if the population was big enough? would the little guys be able to produce the same amount of waste as large fish at that point or even more then large fish? they go to the bathroom a lot and my theory is that you could actually produce more waste per gallon of water then you would with larger fish.
big fish take up space, and you cant crowd large fish per gallon as well as you can little fish, my 50 gal tank was so stuffed with fish you could put your hand in the tank and grab a handful of them without even trying...
would it work?

this is with guppies

wow lol i guess that's the most direct answer ever!!! thank you!

you could definately do aquaponics with guppies, as long as your temps are permissive to keeping them.

I had a 4x2ft tank absolutely full of them once. I never took any out, the population used to manage itself pretty well. one of my favourite fish of all time.

yep, as the others have shown, shouldn't be a problem - it's about biomass versus biofilter volume, not the size of the fish.

As per the title of this thread says yes my perch would fancy guppies for a snack . I might just start breading them if they populate that quickly .
Would it be worth breeding guppies as fish food ?

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i live in an area that pretty much the only feeder fish available are guppies, they come as normal feeder guppies witch are just a bland colorless fish but from the same family.
iv had Oscars and cichlids in my tanks and fed them my fancy guppies for years, they wee always very happy and healthy fish.
if you have an extra tank you can set up that's big enough id say you could have an endless supply of live food for your fish.
key note about breeding guppies would be they are brackish fish, a little bit of salt in the water helps them live longer and breed. make sure you use large stones and rocks in the tank not gravel, you want your baby's to have plenty of area that they can hide in at the bottom of the tank away from the other fish, some baby breeder grass helps as a hide away as well. i believe optimum temperature for breeding is around 76 degrees but that's off the top of my head, the internet is full of great breeding tips.

if you have a little space in your house you could set up a 50gal aquarium with just a dozen fish and within 3 to 4 months that tank will be packed with fish giving you two benefits, one feeders for your AP system and 2 a lava lamp of colors to hypnotize you. if you have never seen a large tank filled with nothing but fancy guppies swimming about your in for a treat!

Depending on what you're feeding them too, they would make a great live feed.

There was a paper published by the guys at Challenger TAFE in Freo where they compared live food (Gambusia) to fish pellets on a batch of barramundi. The live feed produced twice the growth in the barra compared to the pellet feed ! This experiment was conducted in triplicate, so it wasn't a one off fluke.

Joel and Faye had a bunch of mollies in one of the outside tanks last summer that bred up to large numbers. Not sure what they did with 'em in the end. Don't think Faye wanted 'em used as live food.

That's awesome chillidude . Does it matter what type of guppie ? Are any old plain Janes ok?

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I was talking about Gambusia, but as you'll see in the WA Fisheries site, it illegal for you to have them at all.

Guppies should work just as well as they should be fairly similar nutritionally. You'll be amazed how many you need to actually provide a continual supply.

Chillidude, did they work out the cost ratio of the food to feed the gambusia versus the cost of feeding the barra pellets v growth gain?

Nup, as they were catching the Gambusia from the same dam they were trialling the aquaculture system in, i.e. natural supply.

Roughly how Many,would I need per perch ?

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interesting thread.. i'll be watching for more info
i've had rosy red's breed a couple times, but they grow way to slow..
next time i empty a rosy red tank, i'll try guppies..
i had a pretty long wait for my first batch of marmokreb's, after the first berry, my first female went into berry within a few weeks, she just molted again, so i'm expecting another tail full of eggs soon.. my yellow perch and bluegill have been eating them.. and i put quite a few in with the nile tilapia, haven't seen one since

Well, that'll depend on the size. Are we talking silver perch here ?