Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hello everyone,

I have just finished my system in the cold season of Canberra and waiting for the cycle to go through.

2 GBs cut from an IBC and an IBC FT. No sump. Filled with rain water and scoria in GBs. FT is insulated and covered with wood. One pump pumps the water to grow beds and bell siphon takes the water down to FT. Water was murky red in the beginning but cleared after a week. Added some seesol and started testing the water to see if its cycling. It is quite cold in Canberra atm, temps going down to -7 and will get colder I am guessing. The cycling may take longer as the bacteria wouldn't grow at these temps (am I right?).

I was leaning towards the Jade Perch but almost every APers in Canberra are growing trout.
As I understood, with trout, I need an extra air pump for the summer months where water temp exceeds 24C. I also need to find a way to keep the water temp cool. Or go fishless during the hot summer months.

With Jade Perch, I may need to heat the water during the cold winter months.

I am also thinking of buying one of these to feed the fish.

What fish would you recommend for Canberra and from which supplier? If you can provide a link, I would really appreciate.

Cheers

Welcome to the forum GY

Welcome GY.

My thoughts as a relative novice at aquaponics are that, unless you can steal your neighbour's power, the heating costs of keeping jade perch might not be worth it for you. Silver perch might be OK with only a little heating in a Canberra winter... I think that they'll survive above about 6 degrees although they will go off their food once the temp gets below about 18 or thereabouts.

I started off with silvers because they were described as a good beginner's fish and they've proven pretty hardy. They taste just as good as jade perch from my recent taste tests - but are slower growing. There are plenty of forum members who keep them in Victoria and other cold places. But, unless you provide lots of heating in winter, it's probably not much different from going fishless.

Some keep goldfish... but I don't know what they taste like

I know that temperature will impact on speed of cycling... but can't say if there's a bottom cutoff temperature when it stops completely.

There's a very good chance you'll get some more useful feedback from someone in Canberrra... including local suppliers.

Good luck

Welcome GY.

There are good reasons why

Rendand, DD, Scotty thanks for the replies and welcome. See if I can get trout. Which trout btw, rainbow or brown? Can you recommend any hatcheries you dealt with before?

Sent from my SM-N910G using Tapatalk

@GurkanYeniceri - Hi and welcome to the forum