Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi from (freezing cold) Canberra. Thought I'd say hi as have been lurking for ages - basically ever since seeing Joel's system on Gardening Australia we have been plotting and planning a trial system. Essentially at this stage we'd like to get a handle on the concept and have a practice run at eg plumbing growbeds, water testing, keeping fish happy etc before we embark on something bigger and better. Plus our funds this year do no extend this year to the greenhouse, heating etc which we understand we will need to make a larger system viable year round in Canberra's climate. So we're starting small while at the same time eying off every existing bit of backyard space for our 'proper' system (as you do).

SO - what our trial system will consist of: An existing in ground fish pond which we put in about 18 months ago. Approx 2500lt when full. Have at the moment 2 gold fish and about 200 white cloud mountain minnows. This pond has been a labour of love and has been a good learning experience about how tricky it can be to get clear water and happy fish without the proper gear/setup. After battling the green water for a few months we bit the bullet and bought a good quality pump and canister biofilter and finally have crystal clear water and happy fish (hoorah). Pump's a davey something or other, not sure abour biofilter. Will get back to you on that (husband is the hardware guy - all I know is that they were good quality (and not cheap!)). From what I've read though we won't regret spending money on those 2 items.

I did water tests today and got PH of 7.2 and 0ppm for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate (that's all good right - think we are ok with the 'fish tank' side of things?!).

As far as growbeds go, after obsessive research we came to the conclusion that we just couldn't justify the cost of freighting in any of the custom made jobbies and so have gone with the good 'ol bath tub from the tipshop (why wouldn't you). Our pond is located right next to a covered gazebo type thingy so the bath tub will go right above the pond under cover. We are planning flood and drain on a timer and gravity flow back to pond. Planning to plumb the bathtub this weekend (think we understand what to do from a couple of threads on this forum but might need help if we get into trouble - we are not plumbers even of the amateur kind!).

(BTW - I KNOW you guys like photos - they are on the way as soon as I buy the cord to download photos to the computer - this weekend!).

I do have a couple of things I am confused about on which it'd be great to get some advice.

1) bit confused about the order in which to do things. Once the bath tub is hooked up do we plant straight away or do we need to wait until the beneficial bacteria builds up in the growbed? In an existing pond setup do we need to add/do anything to assist this process (urea etc?).

2) bit confused also about temperatures for nitrifying bacteria - am I right in thinking we are unlikely to get the system cycling until the weather warms up (we have had air temps of 0 this week)? Any harm in setting the system up now anyway (eg can we nurture some seedlings along with seasol until the weather warms?).

3) do we need to put in additional fish? The existing fish have already survived a winter and are eating despite the cold. The pond with it's current fish stock is balanced but not sure what happens when we add grow bed plus plants.

Think that's enough to start with... Will update with some photos soon. Thanks in advance for any advice anyone might have.

cheers
Jo

OK - one more question (promise ) - a nitrate level of 0ppm is bad right? So we DO need extra fish to support plant growth?? (now I am confused...)

Two quick points:
nothing wrong with 0 nitrates, you won't get any until the system is cycled - expect an ammonia spike first, then nitrite spike before finally getting nitrates.
It's two different populations of bacteria, and the second lot need nitrites to feed on. More fish might make it a bit faster, but will mostly just make the spikes bigger, causing more potential probs.

Not sure how long cycling will take, but probably months. Stay patient

Get a card reader rather than a camera cord - doesn't waste your camera batteries, downloads faster and more reliably, works for any camera with a compatible card (camera cords can be very model-specific)

Cheers
Stephen

Hi Margate. Uncle Yarra is in Canberra and is setting up a top system. He is a can do kinda guy and would be a good bloke to meet, swap war stories with etc. Send him a pm and say gday.
My home system is based on bathtubs. If u can be bothered, scroll thru twintragics A Not so Tragic Greenhouse thread. Sorry I am hopeless at links.
There are detailed pictures of plumbing the bathtubs. Bit time consuming but worth the read.
No time like the present to start. You will have bacteria in ur canister thingy so cycling is already underway.
Get some gravel for the bathtub and plant away. If ur fish a local species they should eat readily at the cooler temps.
Have fun with it and we love pics!

Here is that link for you, great looking system of bath tubs.
http://backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=1747

Let me get this straight, the pond has been up and running for a while and your little canister biofilter probably is cycled to your small load of fish. Do you have any plants in the pond? If so then they have probably used what little nitrates you had.

After you get the tub plumbed up, test out the plumbing and if you use an auto siphon, loop or bell siphon. Tinker and test that out before you go filling the entire tub with gravel. Much harder to fix things if the gravel is in your way.

Once it is tested out, and you are happy (make sure you have some sort of thing to keep the gravel back from your siphon yet let the water in) then fill the tub with gravel.

You can plant immediately if you have plants needing a place out of their nursery flat but it will be a while before you have the expanded bacteria colonies and you will likely need more fish to provide the nutrients to support those plants. It sounds like you are in cold weather right now so only plant things that would like the cool weather. Lettuce might be ok since it usually does well in cool weather and doesn't need much nutrient.

Something tells me you will want to go with fish that like cold weather.

Since the weather is cold, getting the bacteria up and running for cold water fish could be challenging. You might want to consider fishless cycling but with fish already in the pond, that might be tricky.

Good luck, looking forward to seeing your system and pictures in a thread in Member systems!

thanx TCL.

Hey,

I'm also from Canberra (rivett) and have a system running now (this thread). Had another one which didn't work so great at my parents house (this thread).

I'm also using bathtubs, they're a bloody good option. You should have all the benificial bacteria you need in the system, but if you start loading up the system with extra ammonia it's going to take some time to scale up to handle those levels.

My biggest problem at the moment is temperature. Forecast for tomorrow is 1-14 and the bacteria slow down/switch off when it gets below 8ish. My water temp gets UP to 8, down to 5. Trying to rectify that problem at the mo. Measure your temps tomorrow morning and let us know - you've got a much bigger pond which is dug in so it should be better than mine. Plus if you dig in the bathtubs (or somehow insulate them) then you shouldn't have such problems.

I say start adding some urea to it and watching the ammonia. The GOOD thing about low temps is that ammonia is less likely to kill the fish. The bad thing is that the bacteria take longer to spread. So if you just monitor it, you can add a teaspoon of urea and then do measurements for a week, hopefully see it all being processed and then start adding more and more urea each dose (ever so slowly).

Keep the existing fish, if nothing else they'll be food for something more productive. If you don't have enough in the system, your plants will suffer from nitrogen deficiency (which is exactly what happened to mine). So you kind of need to start putting in extra ammonia carefullly while your bacteria colonise the new grow beds.

PM'd you my ph no if you want it.

Jim Atkinson also has a set-up at Burra. I can't remember his blog address, but there is a thread on burying tanks which he has posted some good temperature data on. He is also doing the greenhouse thing (like I will, eventually....).

Thanks everyone for your replies. Stephen - thanks - will look at camera cards. In the interim will post a couple of pics in members' system thread taken with phone camera. Not v.good quality but should give an idea of what we're working with. TCLynx - yes we have some plants in the pond - which are growing well so yes, that makes sense - those plants are using up all the nitrates currently in the system. Twintragics - your bathtub system is great - we had already had a browse through your thread - v.inspiring. Likewise Gemmell - the pictures on your blog helped us work out how to plumb the standpipe (which I think we did successfully yesterday - yet to test but think it's fine!). Gemmell - thanks for PM - water temp was 6 degrees first thing this morning - brrr. I think that's going to be our biggest hurdle in the trial system. We're going to set it up anyway and see how we go - but don't expect much action cycling wise until the weather warms up. Looking at heating options for next winter is on the list of things to research so will be following your progress with interest. Anyway, will put some pictures up in members' thread now (if I can work out how ). Cheers, Jo

Welcome to the forum Margate, not many of us have gone for the "top of the range" models in BYAP (more fun using bathtubs and such )...think most of your questions have been answered...suggest you take up the offer of the local forumers as they can give more specific answers.

Looking forward to pics and more questions as you develop your system

Or buy TT's system.....