Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

We are in Dolan Speings Arizona and have dairy goats meat rabbits chickens and raised bed garden. We run 3500 watts of P.V. and will run the new solar greenhouse on 115v from the inverter. We also run a well pump and water pressure pump with 24 volts DC from solar and wind charged battery bank. We have been making biodiesel from recycled french fry oil to run the trucks and oil stove to heat the house. Our elevation is 3500 ft and though in the Mohave desert do get down to 15deg. F.
In keeping with our sustainable living efforts, aquaponics seems the next logical step. We pulled the siding off an unused garage and insulated and gypsum boarded the back wall and cieling. The south side is recycled glass doors along with the east and west sides. I am painting the surfaces now and preparing to move in. I have purchased two 150 gal. conical fish tanks and some firestone pond liner. I have a bunch of salvaged 2x4 ft. table tops to make grow beds. The beds will be under the glazing and the tanks back out of the sun. Ratio of GB to tank is planned at 2:1. I have a dozen drums of gylcerol which is the byproduct of making biodiesel which will serve as GB stands and heat sink. We purchased some Bayliss solar vents and have an old evaporative cooler to run direct off P.V.
We will start with 100 gold fish and five gallons of pond water. After a month or so will bring in 100 copper nosed bluegill and start planting. The bluegill should eat the gold fish by time I have the second tank ready and can transfere half of them to it. After one winter we will know what temperature we can hold and if we can keep a faster growing fish. Our summers get quite hot but we hope to be able to keep water below 80 deg. F. Winters may require running several solar water panels and a hot water tank to help hold water temp. Also I have an army surplus tent oil heater that I could run on WVO to hold air temp.
I am concerned about the bluegill surviving the heat and reproducing. They are a relatively cheap fish.....USD 0.26 each plus shipping. So plan to start and learn with them. For crops we hope that tomatoes, chillies and beans will do well. After a dozen of failed attemps at tomatoes here we are about to give up on gardening them.
I have buried, to the doors. a refrigerator freezer in the ground and plan to start black soldier fly larvae production in that once danger of last frost is past. will cut out a space for the crawl ramp from the refer section to the freezer section and collect the larvae in the freezer in a tub. A tub to hold the compost with holes in the bottom and a tub under it to catch the tea should do it. BTW will bluegill eat duckweed? I have salvaged a 10 ft. diameter shallow tank that I could put excess glass on and grow duckweed on rabbit droppings.
Any comments or feed back will be appreciated. Pictures will follow but right now only have the greenhouse shell.

Sounds like you have done a lot of research and planning spiritrancho.
Welcome to the forum and good luck with your planned system.
LB

Boy you have been doing your research.. Welcome to the forum, your set up sounds very interesting looking forward to hearing about your progress. There are a few members who have bluegill, hopefully they will be able to help with your questions.

Welcome spiritrancho! I bet you will do well. Its neat that you are using natural energy sources. I am looking to get a 24 or 48 volt well pump and enough PV to run it during the day. I look forward to seeing pictures of your progress,

Use the rabbit poo to raise worms and feed worms to the fish. Where are you getting the bluegill? Use a light to attract bugs to the tanks? I use a light and it feeds the fish lots of bugs. 100 goldfish will last a few mins. with 100 bluegill. We prolly have the same temp problems. I get down to 0f in the winter and 115f in the summer. 4500' in the great basin desert. My water temps will swing 20 degrees in 1 day. Right now the air temps are 30f at night and 75f in the day. What kind of rabbits do you have?

The goldfish will grow too big for the bluegill to eat if they are stocked first I think.

I have never seen bluegill eat duckweed, but they might. Mine sometimes nibble on watercress, not sure if they are really eating it though. I feed mine, koi pellets, bugs, worms, snails and tadpoles.

Sounds great and welcome, but where are the pictures?

Yes, I have been reasearching. This site is the most important source. Pictures will follow but now only have the empty green house unfurnished. I have read about your system, mean coyote, but yours is outside as I recall. The rabbits are California giants...white with brown face & ears. They dress out at 3 lb. in 10 weeks. Have been using their poo in the garden. Currently feeding red worms animal parts and offal after butchering. They are thriving but it takes them forever to process the stuff. By feeding black soldier fly larvae the stuff first will speed up the process and give fish food. I will try the duckweed anyway and see if the goats, pigs or chickens can eat it. Goats wont like the texture unless dried. If my tank temperature next winter is good enough I may try paku. www.deltaaquaculture.com sells coppernose bluegill as "Dixie Whopper" fingerlings at $0.26 each.
I am using a pump jack like is seen on oil wells but smaller. My water level is 360 ft and the pump cylinder sits at 420. Volatage drop would be very wasteful with DC. With a pump jack the motor is on the surface and is only 1/2 hp. This is a very effiecent design but only allows 4 gpm at 30 rpm. I ran it for some years direct off 480 watts of solar. With more garden area and more demand I went to the battery back up so could run it at night to catch up. I have 2800 gal. storage but that is not enough to irrigate during a cloudy warm spell. I recently added 1200 gal. of rain water cisterns on the house and that will help. If I had to do the whole thing over again I would simply leave the submersible pump in place and put the solar on a grid tied inverter. I have lots of mechanical maintenance on the pump jack and 20 percent of my solar is lost in battery inefficency.

Post pictures anyway!!!!! People here would be interested in seeing the greenhouse too. Heck people here would probably be happy to see most any picture you decide to show off as it sounds like you are living the dreams of some people here.

My rabbits are Californians white with grey face and ears. My bluegill are a cross with green sunfish, Im looking for something else, as they dont grow very fast. Is delta aquaculture in AZ? I did not see much shipping info on there site. When i was off the grid, I pumped water from my 750' deep well with a gas genny, and submersible pump. Pics would be great. Are you going to breed the bluegill?

I will try to breed the bluegill. That outfit is in Georgia. Here is pic of pump jack the garage to rear is now green house. More pic to follow

Pictures Yay! Yep looks like Arizona.

Yep, them are the same kinda trees we got here.

Trees??? I don't think that word means what you think it means...