Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Just dropping an introduction thread to start things off. Me and a few of my friends have been doing a lot of research on this method of growing.

I am looking for others in the Alabama area that are running systems that dont mind a newbie to visit or give advice on starting out with supplies and such.

Here is the long introduction...

I currently have a 1/4 acre garden that my wife and I start as soon as we can, I am located in Northern Alabama near Gadsden. We started harvesting many of our earlier growing plants like Peas and Yellow beans a few weeks ago and the wife firmly stated that she does NOT want another winter of us not having fresh veggies, here comes a green house...

I grew up in North Dakota and besides having our farm, we had 4 250 foot greenhouses that we grew European Burpless cucumbers and vine ripened tomatoes. I learn a lot about maintaining these 2 plants and they are our main food source during the summer now for my family. During the summer we pick around 20-30 14-16 inch cucumbers a day and 10-20 lbs of tomatoes and we eat them all in my family of 6.

I had planned on making raised bed dirt growing in the green house since they are easier to maintain, not bending over so much, but after seeing the aquaponics I was really excited about it. I could live on fish and veggies and would love to if buying fish at the store wasnt so darn expensive. I still plan on having 2-4 48x40 raised beds for plants that I am not sure will do so well in a continuously wet environment, like peppers, and then 4-8 aquaponics beds.

I have done some CAD designs for how I want my system to be laid out. I am in the process of buying 8 of the 275 gallon square containers and going to be hooking them in sections of 4 and putting them 75% in the ground to help maintain water temperature as well as ease of access and eliminate the need for the cage around the fish tank. I will have hoses hooked to the outlets for draining if needed serviced by an old pool pump I had from an above ground pool.

I have changed the design a bit from the video making the planting tray travel on a linear bearing system so that it can slide in and out for ease of access. (I am a Production/Design/Mechanical Engineer and I sit around all day thinking of ways to make things easier, more efficient and more effective)

A friend of mine located 4 VERY big swimming large pool and filers that a local pool had thrown out when they updated their system. I had planned on using these to catch rain water from my house downspouts Each still has the plumbing and I am doing a bit more research on the filtering required and may use them in the system if it is required. (I have cleaned them extensively)

Hi Matthew,

Welcome to the forum

I'm not sure about getting rid of the IBC cages. The bladder is not capable of holding back saturated soil on it's own and if it is accidentally emptied this can also allow the bladder to collapse. The cages might come in handy as bracing against collapse if needed. Hope this makes sense.

Cheers

any updates Mathew, how about showing us your plans?

Well to be honest I fell a bit short with funding. I had a couple of guys interested in helping start it but when it came time to fork over the coin they walked. So I am finishing my other project that is a money maker before starting this. I do have a large amount of supplies to start. I have all the wood I will need to make the 36 inch walls and all the CPVC for the bows and my mom is bringing me the sheeting for the roof from her green house (they have 3 250 foot and 1 200 foot green house in ND. My neighbor has a backhoe that he will let me borrow for free to dig the footings and the pits for the tanks.

Here is a basic design I had been working with.



The outside is the AP systems and the middle is a basic raised bed area for plants that I dont think will do well in the AP.

Some might ask how I will fund it. Here is a picture and video of my 3D Printer I designed. I have over 200 pre-orders and should start production some time next month on filling the orders.

My Solidworks model



Video of first part running.

Video is horrible with how YouTube did the anti shake correction.