Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hello all!
I'm new to Aquaponics and my husband and I are presently setting up our first of many tanks. The property we recently purchased came with 3 commercial greenhouses and aquaponics seems like a good fit in making them productive.
We would be interested in any advice on commercial endeavors anyone has tried / encountered using this system.
Thanks in advance for any help!
Namaste!

Brenda

Hello S. Indiana,

I am new to the forum and new (one season) to AP. I won't try to give you tech advise other than to keep the pump head to a minimum and read the forum posts about getting started. I am from S. Ind. now in W. Ky.
I have found water tanks at reasonable cost new at farm stores. Pumps, plumbing and such are generic, but if you get to 2" pvc pipe be sure to get drain pipe for low pressure water supply. Ask a plummer and it will be clear then.
The rest of what you need to know is in the forum. Also, I found my well water was well suited for startup with some bait minnows to get the system up and running with some flowers and houseplants. Yours may be a bit on the iron rich side so check with the smart people that run this forum on whether that is a problem.
Good luck.

Hey Brenda...

You might want to check out Karens system that she is building here : viewtopic.php?f=13&t=8332

I was talking about water quality and ran across this forum -Water hardness and fish health- by one of the brains.( I think they are respectfully referred to as RSG's (really smart guys))
way over my head. I am not sure if you are in the "good water" area but I know we had a lot of iron in our water in central Indiana and it smelled rather foul.

That you all for the info! We have "city" water so we know we are going to have to filter out the chlorine. And yes, I have already found we have hard water. I think that must be Indiana's curse everywhere down here.
We have been avidly reading everything we can find on other systems. There is certainly a wide variety of ways people are setting their systems up. We are starting with IBCs and will probably try other types and configurations as time goes on. We anticipate having our first greenhouse converted by the end of October. Our first tank should be ready to start cycling next week. We will add tanks as my bedding plants mature enough to transplant. (I'm sowing my own.) We are very fortunate that there is a fish hatchery within 30 miles of us so we will be saving on SH for the fish.
We are really excited about AP, it is such a simple means to provide safe food!