Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Looks amazing so far!

I'll be looking at those pics for days!

Things really ARE bigger in Texas. Nice work Dan. Love those stainless growbeds, but really love the Rubbermaids.

Thanks This is the technical part of the system. The next part is going to be made as natural as possible using as little manufactured goods a possible, ie ponds and using the hills slope ect.. I am going to order a miracle pump and run it from a 19 volt drill and a couple solar cells.

The system cost:
2 300 gallon rubbermades $320
1 100 gallon rubbermade $64
4 420 gallon metal tanks $680
pipe and fittings and valves $270
7 Yards of .375 gravel $280
Pump $70
Excavator rental $200

Total. $1884

What I should have done differently:
1) Use dug ponds or lined 120 inch drainage pipe cut into 12 inch lengths. instead of metal tanks for grow beds
2) Larger Sump. 1 420 gallon sump just barely fills 3 420 gallon tanks of gravel.
3) Thin wall pipe is cheaper but very flimsy should have used the thicker pipe.

Well you certainly can tell AP systems are getting bigger.... by the size of the machinery being used

I've seen smaller aquaculture facilities.....

Awesome Dandi......

More good equipment (boys toys) for the BYAP tool kit

Couldn't see any fish

Dan...a work of art

I am going to see if I can cycle the system on 16 fish. Then I am going to go pickup 150 or 200 tilapia. If I can wait. Its tempting to go for HSM and throw the little buggers in there now.

Way Cool DDM! You've been a very busy boy!

Love the Rubbermaid tanks. What are your pump specs? Will you need to thin the trees a bit for more sun? The loop siphons worked right away or did you need to adjust things?

Awesome.

The loop siphons worked flawlessly on the first try. I had to adjust the height of the overflow tubes on the fish tanks and add a tube to break the siphon. The siphon at the fish tanks was needed to get the water flow out faster. The pump is rated at 3000 gallons per hour at 6 feet head.

I have cut some of the trees. (I love chain saws) The growbeds gets sun about 66% of the day. Nursery's use 30% shade cloth down here so I think this amount of shade will be about right.

We have been having some cool nights and the water temp is 67F so the fish are not eating a lot, but Im helping them out by dosing the system

Don't dose too much!! If dosing fresh, you might find yourself with a sudden big spike your were not expecting as the urea turns into Ammonia.

I like it!!!!!!! Good Job.

I agree you might want to in the future do a larger sump just using heavy duty pond liner in a hole in the ground (with some sort of edging to keep rain run off out of course.) Heck, if you have enough fall in your terrain, you might be able to do some grow beds directly in ground with liner too.

On way to know that your bio filter is really getting established will be when the water gets clear. It takes a while with a fresh system but once the bio slime is coating your surface area, future additions of gravel might cloud the water but it will clear much more quickly!

On my slope I get a 2.5 foot drop over 16 feet. So I Think I will make the next system with a gravel grow bed directly in the ground and the fish tank in a ground pond too.

COOL, I'm looking forward to seeing a terraced system like that!

Love those BIG loops !

152 new arrivals today!


Just the get things kicked off and have a crop this year I had added 152 new tilapia today. There should have been 200, but shipping took out a few and Im sure a few more are on their way out..