Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Freaky......

And the slightly bigger brother:
http://www.4hydroponics.com/hydroponics/omega.asp

How the hell do you harvest the plants?

It`s only 4ft in diameter.. good for really expensive lettuce.
If the plants grow too big they`d probably be precooked by the lights which saves a job i guess

Harvesting? make like a hamster and get a good workout at the same time LOL

The veritcal tube alternative makes a lot more sense to me. Don't have the need to fight gravity on your grow media/nurtient solution falling out

[fade]i was picturing the bed and then taught what about a cone shape? 8ft base to a point at the top.

Then you might get problems watering?
Was thinking the hub will keep the bed from hitting the fishtank walls.

once the grow bed is[glow=green] afloat [/glow]the power needed to push it around would be minuscule however.(one man can push a rather heavy boat once its in the water but cant do that on land) it might even turn with the wind.
i doubt you would need very much psi the trick is the [highlight=red]angle[/highlight] of spray and the [highlight=red]spray bar must be stationary [/highlight]in relation to the said hub [/fade]

tamo the nute solution is actually in the pan at the base of the grow bed. so the roots are constantly being 'dipped' this means any lost in power and you lose the whole lot of plants.

the system is about using all the light from a bulb but a vert system does the same with much more ease.

Probably best suited for drug growing ops

Bit like this CG ...... look like J's towers

Idea though, could have them surrounding a tank and pumped to each tower and drip feed ... drain back to tank

You could use a small flow in the tank to create a current, give the growbed a tug to start it rotating, mass and inertia to keep it going, easy to stop for maintainence and harvesting. No motor or gears, just a dunkin' donut bed.

just add the ranch dressing

Well I have a plan involving

bullrout
water wheels.
striata shrimp
spirulina
earth worms
african cichlids
duckweed
sponge cement
air pump
pvc
cement
salt
wood
clay
water pump
timers
switches
tanks
ponds
guttering
sponge
gutter guard
tubed steel
and lace plants.
But it's too fragmented to explain here

As far as crack pot ideas.. yea I got one. I call it green tide.
It happens see when you mess with the oceans currents (filters). Without the ocean currents moving the water around the sea stagnates. The sun she be hot, the water expands over fertile coastal land and the algae blooms.
So theres the green tide bit, off course it can be green or red or purple or whatever........ but ya it blooms. The blooms may have started in river mouths and ports but every year they will spread. At the end of every massive algae bloom cycle the algae will bust. Most will die. The bacteria will move in to clean it up but with the currents (filters) down it will be the cloudy water bacteria that that reproduce in time to take advantage. They will suck the sea dry of oxygen.... every year the dead zone they create will grow in size. The fish that can, will swim away and survive another day, everything that can't flee will die.
The deads zones will pulse with new seasons, expanding, retracting, and expanding again.
The jellyfish, already loving the fact most of the turtles are gone are having a great time of it. The squids turn out to be the end game winners of mankinds thirst for BOFFF's and pretty much get the sea to share with the jellys by default.
I see a future of crappy ammonia/nitrite readings, algae blooms and fish wipeouts for the big tank. Unless you can stop farmers washing their nitrates out into river mouths with every rain fall, stop the currents slowing and stop the systematic collapse of every fishing industry on the planet.
Anway I think we should build huge weighted base air powered sponge filters in a systematically arranged way along the coast lines. Make them restricted fishing locations and cover them in snags and fish habitat construction.
This way when ever a dead zone wipeout happens at least whatever is in the area has some place of refuge.
Yea I know impractical and all but ya a 'filtered snag ridden safe area'. I'm sure you could make it unfriendly to nets and such heh heh But ya a network of filters to keep the big bad ocean running.... wave powered airpumps would be sweet as the bubble coming up from below drag low in o2 water from the deep to the surface. But nothing would beat a geothermal magma generated air powered filter on the base of the sea....




Long terms fruit tree roots would make a good filter media. Figs in particular come to mind... instead of them blocking pipes, channel or grow roots to rounded ponds and trim the root ball.
Or maybe even willows? could almost just spred clayballs ontop of a willtree root mass and plant a veggie garden.

Brackish tanks take longer than marine (which take longer than freshwater) to cycle but are ususually more stable at higher nitrate levels.... There are 'miracle mud' products available that are just stored versions of the bacteria you would be collecting.

hex, rotating the crop - genius!

One point though.... styrofoam gets soggy and sinks. I would build a raft based off infated wine cask bladders. They are dam strong and bouyant... but they are stopping making or something. Anyway a good cheap float, even if it's just to chuck a few in a boat to keep it from fully sinkin on ya.

Hey Don:
Neat idea, I think you're thinking too small though! I guess the idea is to capture runoff waste to grow stuff, or just to make refuges?

What is sponge cement?

well was meant to be 2 words but....
sponge cement is actually a product tho. A coarse sponge is dipped in cement slurry and then allowed to dry. The ridgid chunk that is left when the cement drys makes an el'cheapo version of the large 'bio cubes' used in aquaculture. I was still experimenting with different cement slurrys and sponge trying to get the best combo of characteristic when I started with the salt/cement mix. That has since pushed the sponge/cement idea to the backburner. However a mate recently tried it with some type of white resin. The sponge was made ridgid nicely, the sponge had large holes, didn't effect water chemistry, was nontoxic and was precut into exact filter shapes. But ya ridgid sponge or hole filled cement....... both seem to provide bacteria with copious places to setup shop.

Everyday the plan comes more and more into reality.
Anyone else breeding shrimp? There is certainly a petshop market for the prettier ones.

mangroves maybe?, works great for filtering aquariums

http://www.athiel.com/lib8/mangrove.htm

Here's one that alway amused me

http://keelynet.com/biology/darklife.htm

"Conducting Chlorophyll Energy over Wires" hmmmm.... What the hell, was that guy smoking when he thought of that. What are the wires suppose to conduct light or something?

Yeah, well here's a crack pot idea that might not just work....

but looks like it's going to work well enough that it's going into full scale production......

Now I wonder if Holden would get behind something like this if we slapped carbon taxs on them......

http://www.theaircar.com/