Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hello everybody, I'm thinking seriously about starting an AP farm in Uruguay. I would like to make a living from it although I don't expect to make a fortune. Living costs are very low in Uruguay and I can pick up a quarter acre lot for $4000 (US dollars). The climate is temperate with long hot summers and short, mild winters. I would like, after a few years of running and tuning the system to make $10k profit per year. Filleted fish sells here for between $4 and $6 per kilo. I would like to use a native fish species like Pacu or Pseudoplatystoma Corruscans.

So here are my questions:

1) Are my desires realistic?

2) Which system is better, the UVI, NFT, flood and drain...?

3) Should I buy a book on AP or is there sufficient info on the web. If I should buy a book or two, which would you recommend?

4) Are any of you using windpumps, solar panels etc to reduce costs?

Any input will be greatly appreciated and I hope to soon be a member of the aquaponics practicing community.
Thanks, Leo.

4) If I wanted to grow more fish, less vegetables and spend less on feed, am I right in thinking I could substitute some of the growbeds with a duckweed pond?

As there are only a few "commercial" Aquaponic people here, it might be a challenge to give you any really definite answers to your questions. Most of us here are really doing this on a backyard scale and not earning any money from it. Most of us are happy if the value of the food we get out of our systems balances the cost of the fish food and electricity we put in and we are not really worrying too much about the payoff of the initial investment in the system since this is more like a gardening hobby to us. Trying to translate that into commercial terms is a big step.

However, you are not the only person lately looking at doing just that.

For any commercial venture it is more about your market. While one person might be able to make a living with an ap system in one location because they have say a thriving market for their produce and fish. Another person might start up exactly the same system in another location and find they have no way to sell their produce or that the government regulations in their location keep them from selling their desired fish or that the permits cost too much.........

There are so many variables.

I suppose a person might manage to glean enough info off the internet but remember that much of the info on the internet might not be very reliable so you spend a lot more time chasing down additional sources to try and confirm what you read and you still usually need to take everything with some common sense salt.

There are books out there for sale about aquaponics as well as system plans and perhaps better yet for your situation, some seminars or training courses.

Some things to research...............
Cost of land
Costs of building (materials, labor, government fees/taxes)
Electricity and utilities
Type of fish and plants in relation to climate? Will you need a greenhouse and heating, big costs.
Source water (this is pretty important though not as big a deal as in straight Aquaculture but still needs thought)
Type of system (lots of choices here and it may depend on the plants you wish to grow and other materials)
If flood and drain, source of non limestone gravel or other media. And the transportation of said media.
Sourcing/costs and transport of fish fry to grow out
Sourcing/costs of plant seed
Marking and transport of both fish and plant products for sale.
Labor to run/maintain system
labor in planting and harvesting plant crops
Labor for harvesting fish
Facilities for those operations to meet whatever food guidelines are appropriate.

The Market is the most important part of all of this since the sales will need to pay for everything else on the list before you get to start counting any profit.

Start working on your business plan but you will likely need to keep editing it as you learn more about the realities of AP. If you have the money to buy and build without needing to get any loans, it might be easier to make into a reality but definitely make sure you have a really good market for your goods or you will be loosing money.

I have to echo TCL's thoughts... don't proceed down the path of "commercialisation" of AP.. unless you have thoroughly research your market and prepared a totally realistic business plan...

And not until you have researched and totally understand the principles of the various AP models... and the raising of your preferred fish species... particularly the time required for grow out... and the FCR for the species...

At $4-6/kilo.... I'd suggest that your startup,feed, power,land and labour costs ... may mean that you wont break even for several years... and making even a "modest" $10K profit each year could be marginal...

Particularly if you were to misplace your focus...and apply the wrong model...

Basically, most backyard systems concentrate of food production... and flood and drain is a very applicable model for this purpose... but scaling it to a "commercial" level is... IMO... difficult... due to the footprint,hardware and plumbing requirements... and the potential points of failure...

The UVI model and/or NFT addition.... focus on fish production.... basically RAS aquaculture... with all the associated pre-filter requirements and external filtration requirements...

While they are capable of producing an abundance of vegetable stock... it is limited to certain types of plants that are best suited to the style of model.... and usually limited to fish species that have low water quality and oxygenation requirements... such as Tilapia...

Your selected fish species, must not only have an end market... but must be either semi-sustaining from natural foods... or be fast growing and pellet fed...

Long growth periods, obviously require lengthy pellet feed supplementation... and increased cost...

Given your return of $4-6/kg on fish fillets.... you may be better to focus on plant production, rather than fish production...

If you really want to focus on fish production... then think seriously, and compare the costs of a traditional aquaculture operation, (even with the attendant infrastructure costs) with that of an aquaponics system...

And be very mindful, that either, requires a reliable, constant energy supply.... it doesn't take long to kill a lot of fish if your pumps and aerators aren't working.... and it takes a period of time to regrow any fish stock to market size...

Well, thank you very much for those excellent replies. Lots of food for thought.
Any books you could specifically recommend to help me decide which system would be best suited, as I suppose all cost calculations depend on that.
Thanks again!

try the bosses book and magazines
http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/furth ... mation.htm