Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

hello. i'm located in wentzville, missouri and this is my first attempt at a aquaponics setup.
our summers are hot, and winters are freezing.
i am concerned about keeping fish alive over the winter and through the summer.
i do not have indoor space for this project. so i was wondering if building a greenhouse was something i should consider? and if it would be practical.

my setup is going to be solar powered. i currently have a 80watt solar panel, i am wanting to try and keep everything 12 volts. i have a 12 volt fountain pump already. and based on my math i might need another pannel to keep my pumps running overnight and through cloudy days. unless i find a way for 120v backup.

i plan to pick up 3 large 275 gallon IBC totes this weekend. i want to use one as my fish tank, another for rainwater collection, and i dont have plans for the last two but i dont think they will be big enough for the growbeds id like to have.

i am wondering if i can keep tilapia and bluegill in the same tank? will they fight or kill eachother?

i am wanting to have long growbeds but cant afford tons of expanded clay balls.
i was considering small lava rock because of the size, and cost. any feedback on that is appreciated.

as for the long growbeds i was thinking about buying multiple totes and cutting the ends off and sectioning them together to create one long one, using silicone and bolts to seal them. but am open to suggestions

i was thinking about some kind of wooden frame with a thick liner inside of it. but have not done much research on that yet.

Hello aidynphoenix welcome to the forum

I would definitely consider building or buying a greenhouse or use a shed to overwinter your fish. You can either overwinter plants and fish or just the fish. Which you choose to do will determine the size of the greenhouse or shed you build. I'm not sure about the reliability of 12V water pumps and how much heat, aeration, and ventilation you would need to keep the system going in the Winter. You'll need good ventilation and shade cloth for the Summer. The grow beds act like heat exchangers so unless you can afford to contain the whole system in the greenhouse just run it as a Recirculating Aquaculture System (fish only but with solids and bio-filtration) during the Winter and reconnect the grow beds up for the growing season. Done this way the grow beds can be drained and left outside. Harbor Freight has some inexpensive greenhouses that might work for you, although, some reinforcing is a good idea. With coupons a 10 X 12 is about 600 dollars but that doesn't include fans or screens for ventilation or any of your shade cloth or lumber.

I think I've seen where someone had Bluegill and Tilapia together. They'd probably be alright together unless there was a large difference in size but the Tilapia would grow much faster. Tilapia on the other hand would die at around 50 F and I think you'll have troubles maintaining that even in a greenhouse using only solar - It would have to be really well built and well insulated. Another reason to only run the fish (less water to heat).

Lots of us use lava rock aka scoria. I use the 3/4 inch size and it works well. I also have some that are expanded clay balls and can see no difference in plant growth. It is a bit easier to clean out the clay balls though.



Sounds like a nightmare to me - you'd never get them sealed properly. Just build a wood frame and line it with EPDM pond liner. There are several builds on BYAP that give you enough to figure out your own. You can use it for a media bed or a Deep Water Culture bed using styrofoam rafts (or some other floatation perhaps). Keep in mind that it's tough to reach across a 4 ft wide plant bed so in a greenhouse you'll have to adapt the structures to use space effectively.

@aidynphoenix - Hi and Welcome

thank you very much for the welcomes and information.

i will definitely go with the pond liner now, that seems much simpler. i was thinking of having rows that are 8 feet long, and maybe a foot or so wide.

is there a ideal time between the beds filling and draining i should shoot for? that way i can determine how many GPH my pump needs to move to make that happen? or is that hard to determine because the grow medium displaces a lot of volume too?

i will go with the red lava rock its cheap and i can get it by the yard from a local place.

is there any problems related to rain i should be concerned about? will the rain water adjust the ph by much? should i include some kind of overflow system so that excess water has a place to go?
~john

You should probably decide which type of system you want to build, AP or RAS. Then you can figure out what type of structures, beds and filtration you need.

The beds seem a bit narrow but I don't know where you're thinking of placing them. If you build an AP system you might want the beds wider for the added filtration. Consider cost of pond liner, building a 1 foot wide trough could use a 3 ft wide strip of liner, making it 1 ft wider only uses an extra foot of liner, while building another 1 foot wide trough... (hope you get where I'm going). Greenhouse space is pretty expensive so you want more beds and less aisles . For something as narrow as that you could make NFT channels (but these might not give you the filtration you want). I'd advise you not to do any buying or building until you figure out what you're trying to build and how much you're willing to spend. Once you have a plan, draw it out and post it for suggestions. Might get some conflicting ones but there are lots of ways to do this

The cycle time for the flood and drain doesn't seem to matter much, when I used siphons my beds would flood and drain anywhere from every 6 minutes to every 15 minutes and the plants were fine either way. I no longer use siphons to flood and drain, just do Constant Flood where the water is always moving but the bed is always flooded to within an inch or two of the top.

Most likely the rain won't be a problem except you should provide an overflow.

Scotty,

Did you see any changes when you switched to constant flood? Did some plants like or not like one drain method?

Lmannyr & aidynphoenix,

When you are considering which way to build your next system. I would consider the BYAP trials thread required reading.

viewtopic.php?f=51&t=8621

Good read that was. What I got out of that thread is constant flow cycles faster, constant flow and timed flood and drain trikes better growth. Som plants prefer on system over the other.

Constant flow for me for now.