Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

or put it in a tank with jade perch

Hi Monya!

How much water do you need to top up your system? Like how much needs to be available in a top-up tank to keep up with evaporation?

very little DD. We turn the top up tap on once every couple of weeks, I expect we put in around 200-300 litres, i have never measured. We have about a 1000 litre window of opportunity to top it up before things stop working, the growbeds in the greenhouse, the tank covered with 90% shadecloth and the sump completely covered certainly helps in this regard

Thanks! Have fun with the colder weather crops!

You have to be carefull of Lebs ,, some are great but if you get too many ,, your in BIG trouble.

Great sytem Monya! Thanks for the pictures.
What did you build your grow beds out of?

Hi Monya:
I tried using the contact and photos pages and am getting an error. Do you see that too?

http://www.thefishfarm.com.au/photos.asp

Error here too

Me to

Monya awsone system! What did you use for grow beds?

Since Stu is a dial up boy - I can give you a bit of info while you wait for him Mike. They are aquaculture trays that were previously used for housing crays I believe. The dimensions are 3400cm x 1500cm x 500cm and they are made of HDPE I believe. Each of them therefore holds about 2500 litres if full. Don't ask him how much they paid for them, it will just upset you

Stu
Great to see an update. Good luck with the winter vegies.

Very nice looking system! I like the fact that you can put a green house (Cold frame) over it.

They are ex-abalone trays, VB has dimensions right (except it's mm not cm's ), and we have them pretty full. about 9000 litres of gravel.

Thanks for the Heads up on the site link not working, I must get Dan to check that out. Thanks DD, i got your PM and got distracted

We have planted out all the winter seedlings, 34 punnets in all. Now we will plants some peas and broad beans in the gaps. We have one kilo each of greenfeast peas, sugar snap peas and broad beans from eden seeds which we are planting in the olive grove as a green manure/food crop. We are doing our olives organically. Every one thinks we are mental as it poses a lot of challenges, and is nowhere near as easy as just spraying etc but we are finding the planning process interesting and hopefully the end product will be worth it. We have just had a pond excavated for our geese and we are fencing them into the orchard very soon. They will graze the grass and fertilise, so we won't need to do slashing. It only takes 2 geese to do the job of one sheep. Aoparently My goal is to sell the slaher which would mean we are using animals to mow all our weeds and grasses. We are getting pretty close.

One thing that is pissing us off is something eats our broccoli seedlings. They prefer different varieties (not joking) and 6 seedlings right next to siz cabbage seedlings were demolished in one night, and the cabbage was untouched. grrr. We think either rats or possums. I think the only way to keep them out is a concrete strip around the bottom of the greenhouse and actually build the shed which has been in the planning stages for months It will hopefully be a rat and possum exclusion zone. We have set a rat trap in one of the growbeds, be interesting to see if it catches anything. Does crap ya off though when you plant nice healthy seedlings and vermin eat them.

I have a possum problem, solved it by putting some bird netting around the veggie patch. could be a short term solution if your not ready for the shed build.

H.