Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi all, I am completely new to aquaponics, I don't like fish and I don't like lettuce but I love the idea of playing god to my own small universe, plus I live with other people who do like that sort of thing so the produce won't go to waste.

I have a tiny back yard in the North of North Brisbane with a formal mediteranean theme so anything that goes in is going to have to look nice, half the cost will be going on the equipment, the other half will be spent trying to hide it all.

I have a few traditional raised beds which are underperforming as they are in the shade, good for a few herbs but not much else. I am hoping to dig the earth out, raise the height and drop an aquapoinic system straight in, surely it is as easy as that right?

I currently grow, vanilla, cardamon, peppercorns, cloves, cinammon, tumeric, ginger, olives, horseradish, pineapples, kiwi fruit, grapes, passionfruit, tea, coffee and various herbs. No real food but plenty of condiments. I produce enough for about one person to have a light snack once a year. I am hoping that this will change once I can make better use of the space and the watering (I have pretty much drained a 5000 litre rainwater tank with the dry weather this November)

My goals for the aquaponics project are to produce fish, because my wife does not believe it can be done and I live to prove her wrong. Grow spinach because we use a ton of it. Make use of the shaded parts of the garden. Grow beetroots and finally get a crop of tomatoes, I buy about $45 worth of pots, soil and tomato plants each year and produce about $5 worth of tomatoes. I would also like to make it look like the kind of thing that you would need to point out to people, so no exposed pipeworks, pumps, plastic boxes or dead fish.

How hard can it be?

Wow, you grow a lot of stuff for not getting much out of it.
how does the ginger, turmeric and kiwis go? Have they produced ?
I know pineapples take about a billion years to get a fruit, I don't think I will ever plant one.

As far as hiding things goes, look at peoples systems on this forum, there are some very good looking and creative systems. I have seen some great IBC systems clad in decking timber and look awesome.

actually a pineapple takes 2 years to produce fruit,,, i had one going pretty well, but it turned out the cat's loved the leaves when i had it inside last winter, they completely destroyed it!

Welcome to the forum JisLiz!

Here you will find everything you want to know.

LOL and.probably a lot that you don't want to know, take the rest with a grain of salt.(Message for the day)

Exactly, a billion !

Thanks for the welcome folks, already learning plenty, it all sounds a bit crazy but it might just work!

Ginger and Tumeric are the easiest things I have ever grown! But you don't need much in recipies.

They don't have deep roots but they do like to spread out so it is best to keep them in pots, also makes it easier to harvest. Just go to a supermarket and buy the least shrivelled rhizome you can find and then bury it and forget it. Mine have just come up for this year. I tend to leave them in for two years but that is only because if you do that the Tumeric has the most amazing flowers! You can dig them up each year and just leave some in the pot.

From one small bit of tumeric, after two years of growth, I have managed to produce more powder than I will ever actually manage to use. I can't give it away fast enough. I have also now got five pots of plants and they grow fast, don't seem to care if I flood them or forget them and they get about 1 hour of direct sunlight at midday.

I waited to pick the ginger when it died down, very intense flavour. We use it and I gave away most of it, not sure how long it keeps but I won't be needing to buy any for a year or two. Next time I will dig it up earlier and try pickling some as well as powdering it.

The pineapples are very slow, we got bored waiting and ate the last one before it was ripe. I can buy them for $1.50 at the local market so I have decided not to bother any more.

I am looking forward to the planting but I think I will just stick with what I already have, I was tempted to try water chestnuts and wasabi as they like wet environments but I am not sure how much of that stuff I would actually need.

Ginger might grow in the beds as well, will certainly make them easier to clean, however I am worried that it might get a bit top heavy or take over.

Interesting times ahead!

Just read your post about growing ginger and turmeric and I have been wondering if you would have any photos of the flowers, particularly of the edible ginger. I have two or three different types in my garden that are fragrant, but not sure if I can eat them, I keep getting the plants mixed up. The turmeric flowers sound lovely too, I lurve flower photos

Gday,
Any updates yet on your progress ?

Well the edible ginger flowers are very dissapointing, particularly as the non edible varieties are so attractive. The edible ginger flowers are just small white and boring, so I haven't taken any pictures however my galangals are in flower at the moment so I will take some pictures and find my tumeric flowers as well (I have some vanilla flowers on the vine at the moment so I will take some of those as well)

I am awaiting some instructional books and DVDs to arrive for Christmas before I decide to go all in with aquaponics, so far I am looking forward to the experiment but I have a lot of unfinished projects first!