Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi folks, So much to do so, little time... sounds like a retiree speaking? That's me. How is it I never did or wanted to do any of this sort of stuff when I was younger (and much more fit)?

Now I'm as excited about getting into aquaponics as a kid with a new toy.

At the moment I have a small (500lt) fish pond into which, about 8 months ago, I put 25 small comets. I then added 15 marron fingerlings(?) about 50mm long. Some marron were lost after climbing out but the fish were doing well until one morning I came out to feed them and there was only 1 biggish fish left - compliments of a hungry egret.

Lesson learnt. Protect the fish. I aquired more goldfish and 5 Koi ranging in size 150mm to 400mm, and protected them with an old prawning net. Within a week there were 3 marron lying dead on the bottom of the pond. Another lesson learnt. Insufficient filtration. So I bought a 20ltr bucket and fittings and built what I hope will be a reasonable biofilter.

Next stage will be growbeds and reticulating the pond water through them. That's why I'm here, to find out how the experts do it.

Other hobbies & pastimes:
Homebrew beer - of course
Growing vegetables
Dragging the 'van around the state a couple of times a year
accompanied by the missus and Jessica our whippet
Meeting twice a week with other old f*rts at the Men's Shed

Cheers folks

Welcome to the forum

I think you should attach a grow bed to that pond and you have an instint AP system

G'day wood4me!


There's some homebrew threads here viewtopic.php?f=5&t=11106

and http://www.backyardfarming.com.au/phpbb ... f=28&t=212

Welcome Wood4me...

G'day Gazza,

Thanks for the links.

You got some marron going, may I ask what do you feed them?

I scored my first IBC today. Not knowing how to clean it, I may look for or start a thread on the subject.

Cheers

Unfortunately the marron went walkabout and never came home But I wasn't feeding them anything specific, I think they get by on whatever is floating around in the tank, and each other...

There have been quite a few posts on IBC cleaning, try the advanced search in the menu bar

or the IBC of Aquaponics http://ibcofaquaponics.com/
Welcome wood4me

Welcome wood4me :-)