Greetings gardeners! I'm a 19 year old film student from good green oregon. I love makin electronic music, makin movies, drawin/animating, and aquaponics (even though ive never tried growing food or keeping fish)!
I've been lurkin on these forums for about a week. I first heard of aquaponics on the Daily show where the guest was pitching vertical aquaponic farms as the solution to the rising food crisis. I thought the idea was brilliant. I had no idea aquaponics was even possible. But now that i did, my mind wanted more. I went and found as much information as i could because i knew i wanted to try this. I drew up a bunch of potential designs for small aeshtetically pleasing fountain/farms that i wanted to build:
After some lurking on these here forums, i realized that a few things were wrong about several of these designs. But that one in the upper left seemed just-about right. Deep GB with decent room and spacing, big aquarium, not half bad looking. I've since drawn up more designs for the same type
Basically the idea is to embed the fishtank in the growbed (with the fish tank rim being elevated roughly an inch above the growbed surface [i know it doesnt look that way in any of the drawings but just go with me on this one]). The fish tank either overflows or is filled until it drains down a center pipe and into the growbed where there are small drainage holes take the water back into the sump (perhaps through crushed oyster shells first). and the sump pumps it back up the center column back to the tank. The pump is on a timer to allow the GB time to drain fully. The pump i got is a 1200lph 1.6m head max
But a few questions:
1: can the pump output tube end at the tank bottom, or does the pump have to run all the way to the surface?
2: Tank overflowing out the sides or use the central pipe to drain in the GB? If i drain out the side i can put some filter stone at the drainage areas to catch solids, if i use the pipe i should probably put the solids filter IN the drainpipe, which would probably eventually clog yea?
3: Switch the sump and the aquarium?
4:Youll notice on these second designs have a hollow unit in the center where the aquarium would go, how big can this be? that is, how wide do the grow spaces need to be? right now theyre about 1 foot deep and 3-6 inches wide (in some cases tapering out deeper further down)
Once i figure these things out im on my way!
