Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hey Guys/Gals,

My name is Geoff. I'm a newbie to Aquaponics only heard about it a year ago which is weird as a large part of my adolescent life was to do with fish. (Maintained Tropical, Native, Saltwater aquariums, studied Fisheries Management and Aquaculture and worked in the aquarium industry as a distributor for Eheim)
Been in a completely different industry for the last 7 years but even with this previous knowledge, I still feel like a newbie. So I apologize in advance for any basic questions that may seem like they are being repeated.
Currently about to move into a new place which is close to completion. The current proposed site is quite narrow but the area approx is 2.3m wide by 6m length. There is an Easement that run 0.5m below the ground the length of this area. So can't dig down to far.

My current idea is to get a round rainwater tank approx 1500-2000L which will act as the fish tank? Depending on the height it will either sit on a stand or sit on the ground. This will be on the far left hand shaded corner of the pic. I will have a sump that will act as a growbed water runoff trough (explained later) to the right of the fish tank that will pump water up to the fish tank. The water is fed from the fish tank via a "SLO" up to the front of the pic.
This is where it gets tricky a friend of mine who is a landscaper proposed from the front of the pic to the back of the pic to put pond liner down but make sure the ground is dug in a way that it slopes inwards from the edges(eg wall & fence) but the whole area slopes towards the sump. I would cover the whole area (approx 4-5m length x 2.3m wide) with a foot of scoria. So essentially there is no growbed containers it's like a planted dried up creek bed which you can have stepping stones to get through it. Another proposed edition is on the closest right wall there is room to build upwards planter boxes onto the wall to gain more access to the sun that goes from left of the pic to right.

My apologies for no diagrams as I'm not that computer savy.

These are some initial ideas look forward to your thoughts

Geoff

Thought I'd get some more precise area calculations today

Length 880cm (edge of wall bottom right corner of pic to the fence in background of pic)
Width 240cm (closest wall (404cm length) to fence on left of pic)
Width 290cm (far window wall (476cm length to fence on fence on left of pic)

I approximately think that 3m x 2m will give me enough area to have the fish tank(rainwater tank) and sump. So if my growbed is on the ground and 30cm deep I have an approx area of 550cm x 240cm x 30cm/1000L = 3960litres of growbed volume.

Are my calculations right and more importantly can an open growbed as described above in my first post work?

Also went through my garage and found some items which may be useful
-new eheim 1262 pump
-eheim air pump
-approx 10L of Substrate pro media
-300w jäger heaters

Is the pump big enough to use for such a large system? (In the past this sort of pump was able to look after a smaller aquarium setup of 800L tank and 250L sump pumping to a height of 5.5ft)

Can the substrate pro media be used in my setup?

Hey I'm not sure about your sizes but I'm excited for you
Looks like a nice area.
Your pump has to pump the volume of the fish tank per hour I think (or is the entire water volume of the system?)

Hey Jayendra,

Thanks for the reply . Yeah I'm really excited about the whole project. Unfortunately as we haven't moved in as yet it's a bit hard to start obtaining large items for the system. But I'm always on the lookout. The girlfriend is excited but not as much as me, but she is a more scared of me turning half of our backyard into a junkyard.
So I've been told it needs to be aesthetically pleasing on the eye. That's how my landscaping mate proposed using the ground as a growbed to try and do away with growbed containers/stands etc.

As for the pump I guess its a hard question to answer as we don't know exactly how big all the components will be. Worst case scenario could have it as a backup pump or preferably use it within the fish tank to circulate the water.

Hi Geoff, it looks to me that against the brick wall will be the best place for your growbeds judging by the available sunlight and shade from the fence in your photo, when the sun is lower during winter you will want to catch all the natural light you can. Your girlfriend might not want the window being obstructed with a view of growbeds so maybe you could put the fish tank nearer the fenceline.
If you do a drawing of your yard with whatever setup you decide on and post it on the forum we can help with more ideas and info.

miniorb with decking edging is nice on the eye - see my barrel thread.
I like recycled pallet wood or decking.
You could do that brush screen or bamboo screen.

Are you using IBC's?

Thanks for the reply Hairycamel
Yeah tank will go in back left shaded corner.
Need to work out exactly how much light area gets but as you said wall looks like best suited growbed area.
Just want to know if using media on pondliner across most of area will work as a growbed. Otherwise it will cost me more to get scafolding type boxes built up wall.

Hey Jayendra, thanks will checkout edging on your link.
As for ibc use no wont be using them at the moment:
-fish tank i want round for SLO
-current sump setup is long rectangular container or hole/pondliner
-and growbed is ground/pondliner until told otherwise

Can this work??? Need your help please.

As in... an in ground pond with pond liner but filled with rocks (maybe 30cm deep?) then a sump that it drains into that is deeper?
Yes that will work but you'll need to have the sump lower than the 'ground-level' growbed.
Theres a guy on here from India that uses this method.
But don't slope the growbed - have it flat.


Planter boxes or NFT tubes will also work along the wall.
I would be doing both to get maximum growing space.

Most plants like morning sun so the fence side is better - but the advantage of the wall is that it will emit ambient heat at night after a nice warm up in the sun in the avo.

make a drawing or Sketchup model for more help.

Close but no in ground pond.
This may sound stupid but think of a kids slip and slide. You have water sliding down the slide eg plastic pond liner. Add a foot of scoria on top and the water is plumbed strategically at the top of the plants running through the scoria down to the slide which then drains in at the end to a sump. So there is no in ground pond built. The sides of the slip and slide (pond liner) would be raised slightly to stop water going over the outer edges.

Potential Issues:
-water height minimal
-Will roots get enough water initially

Will it be better if I make trenches for the plants to be in that way water volume is controlled better and plants would receive more water and water height would be raised due to flowing down narrow channels rather than flatbed.

Yeah you don't want a slope - you want the water to stay at the same height throughout the bed.