Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi Guys met up with member dbird, he only lives a few streets from me and only met him through this site. Don builds Shelters, Greenhouses, Silo's, Stock feeders ETC and I think semi retired (Can't say retired because you can never slow the older boys down), I am going to start this thread for him and have edited his pictures to fit the site, but Don will no doubt give more info and answer any questions you may have.
Don has a mix of Aquaponics and HydroPonics inside picture 1, The thing that blew me away when visiting was don has over half a dozen Banana trees growing in buckets, these trees are around 20 foot high, picture below shows they have banana's on them, what amazes me is the banana's are growing 200km southeast of Perth and at the moment it is around 4 - 5 degrees at night and 18ish during the day. The Banana's are on Hydro as with a Couple of Fig trees, Orange Tree, some other tropical fruit that looks like an egg and tastes like mango (what was the name of that plant you gave me Don), and heaps of other stuff that I can't even remember, Don also has an aquaponic system under the same structure, 2 x 1500lt (roughly) tanks and a maze of trays and piping, done has a few trout and yabbies at the moment, but is looking at a bigger system, growing from his AP system is Cucumbers, Cherry Tomatoes, Chillies, Capsicum, Various herbs, Gooseberries, Strawberries grown in huge tubes, and again whatever else I forgot, no doubt I will get some more Pictures from Don to show you all his Jungle.
Don thanks for the tour, and thanks for the veggies and plants and send me some pictures of the amazing plants you have. I think Don's system could be one of the 7 Wonders of Ponics.
If you reply to this thread can you please address posts to Don, I am showing him how the forum works and have only started the thread for him.

Very nice indeed Don, are you putting up 2 GHs of the same size??

Looks like a 2nd frame there in the last pic

Now thats a green house

yep, kinda puts our meek efforts in there place :envy:

Ell and Others this DON"S thread please address posts to him, I only helped him get started in th forum his member name here is dbird

Awesome setup Don

That a serious greenhouse to fit 20 foot banana trees. Looks like there is room to spare as well.

Would love to see some pictures of the AP and all the various plants growing off it.

Could you post a picture of the buckets that the bananas are grown in and how you are irrigating them? I have been thinking of bananas in buckets for the new extension of my home system.

No that's the cover over the swimming pool ,I have had to replace the cover after ten years. It gets used as a GH during the winter as well but not in summer. If you close it up to keep the water warm it cooks the plants. Will post another pic when the cover is on. Don

Will send you some soon pictures soon,I am also having computer problems and I am not very computer literate .The two are a bad combination.The buckets are half 200 litre drums.Cheers,Don.

Woohoo, looks like ill be growing me some bananas

Banana's in Kalgoorlie OB, Man they would go well I think your way, gotta be a way to hook them to aquaponics, may need a heap of fish poo though, but someone has to try it, can't see it not working, don's hydro feeding works well, we got to make make it work for AP,


Don your doing fine, if we teach you to much you will end up divorced

No bananas in Kalgoolie??.
Tree's in AP systems should be ideal ,, large uptake of nutrients .
Banana's could well be ideal ,, large surface area of leaf to spray Moringa spray ..... sorry OBO couldn't resist.

The other great thing about banana trees ,, the leaves ,, yes leaves sell at a GREAT price,,, the Vietnamese Aussies , Chinese Aussies , Thai Aussies ,,use them for wrapping fish and sweets before steaming ,, good money to be made from that.

They will be planted in the next phase of system, which involves 500 litre growbeds

yeh... well I guess you guys already have holes that big.... 500ltr phewww

Nah - surface beds this time