Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Has anyone seen or heard anything about the Taro AP System?
http://www.friendlyaquaponics.com/doitmyself.html

They claim to have taken the info from the UVI system training course and made it cost half as much to build and use electricity to operate. Of course they want $800 to tell you how

I suspect they just put it all in the ground instead of using tanks..

Ok, I answered my own question

It is a floating raft system.

They are also doing dirt AP

The Dirt AP growbeds look almost ideal for crawfish! Would just have to make it a little deeper add D.O. and make it escape proof. The other problem seems to be rainfall/evaporation In southeastern Louisiana all the nutrients would get washed out while in west Texas you would loose to evaporation. I would need a medium sized greenhouse to keep rain out. Floating rafts doesn't seem to work nearly as good as flood and drain but I guess they can be incorporated in a large system.

I think their main improvement to the UVI model is that they figured out how to source cheaper materials locally for themselves and here is the big one, they found the appropriate blower to run their system without costing them out of business on electricity.

DWC can grow plants very well but you need lots of aeration.
I've grown plants hydroponically in DWC and found the growth of the plants with good bubbles under them is so much better than the plants over in the corner of the bin where the bubbler has quit working.

These DWC systems are gonna be all about the aeration for the fish, the bacteria, and the plants (provided you have adequate filtration functioning properly.)

Bit slow guys - they have been a forum member, and posting about if for several weeks

http://backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=4577&hilit=uvi

http://backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=4579&hilit=uvi

Oops

Yep, that's where I got my info on them, was from some of the answers they gave to posts a while back.

The floating raft system makes it easier to mass produce imho. You can create an assembly line of sorts and it makes changing stock in the GBs much easier, you plant as you harvest.

I saw a floating raft system that was used in mexico on some discovery documentary. It was pretty intense how they ran it. I don't think it was an aquaponic set up, i feel like it was just hyrdoponics, but either way I remember thinking how similar it was to an auto-mobile assembly plant.

When I was trying all forms of hydroponics the DWC out preformed everything, including flood and drain. However, it does require a lot of air and a lot of time to tie up some crops. and the more equipment you add the more expensive to run and more prone to failure than flood and fill. Still, I would like to try some rafts.