Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

He wants to filter it? I have seen a few you tube clips on people having to clean their grow beds because of solid build-ups, that’s not good for your plants and often leads to a spike in water quality which is not good for your fish, most clips the good ones show that it’s the ammonia that starts the nitrite going which end up as nitrates for you plants, very few say that the fish waste will do anything than block up your media, depending on stocking levels and grow beds, if it worked perfectly we wouldn’t have a RFF on most systems these days, that is why I went one step further by making a paint bag filter to eliminate any solid partials getting to the grow beds from the RFF, that could be why my KH is a 4, in such an early system, its like me buying the AC/DC air pump as a precaution from power outs, you don’t want to repeat others mistakes and lose fish or plants, there are no guaranties in this aquaponics setup, its like insurance! You only like it when it pays out! And then its too late?

It is better that the water go through whatever filter you are going to use before it goes through the pump but there are lots of systems where this isn't done and they still work ok.

Your GBs should filter out fines and if they are not maybe change the relative position of the inlets and outlets (often easier said than done).

I've only had a problem with fines if the flow through the GB was being short circuited.

No it is not good it is in fact awful but if people will design systems that goes against all the experience we have on how to successfully operate GBs long term without any significant clogging then they have to deal with the pain of awful water quality, poor plant growth, fish deaths and the back breaking effort of cleaning their GBs.


While I will accept that there has been a massive increase in the number of people installing RFFs it is a pretty big call to say that most systems have them. The myth that RFFs are essential in AP has been promulgated by a number of individuals who have a background in recirculating aquaculture. Despite a massive body of evidence that GBs can and are consistently run in AP systems without any need to clean the GBs. These people discount the experience of many of the members on this forum who have run media based system for years without any signs of appreciable clogging at all.

If you are going to filter your water to that degree then much of the value of a media based system is defunct. Why not go for NFT or DWC if you are going to treat your water to that degree.

I'm all for insurance but the important thing about learning from others mistakes is to identify what went wrong and why it went wrong before you decide on what is the lesson to be learnt. While learning from mistakes is valuable, learning from success has at least equal if not greater value. There is a place for traditional AQ filtration technology in some AP systems but that place is not because media based solids processing doesn't work.

Stop relying on youtube for info, anyone can post any crap there......

Yep the water is going through the filter before the pump In the sump

Different people have their systems set up differently if you watch the vid you can see that the fish tank overflow is not a slo the slo goes to the filters

Different people have their systems set up differently if you watch the vid you can see that the fish tank overflow is not a slo the slo goes to the filters