Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hello all from South Carolina USA!

I've been thinking of aquaponics for a few years but never found anything about it, till lately. I've finally moved back to my family land, I've got a small acre, and I knew I wanted to do some sort of farm. I'm interested in homesteading. But the soil here is hard clay and rocks, plus the snooty neighborhood up the hill has pretty much stopped any type of farming or anything like that in the area. However Ithink something like this would work, no smell, no noise. No one will know it's anything other than a small garden and a "fish pond".

So I'm still looking over the info and trying to figure out a few things. So I have a couple preliminary questions. Is there a formula for designing a system that says you need x amount of Grow bed ratio to fish, and x amount of water per fish? Also I'm thinking I want possibly trout and crayfish. I don't much like to eat fish, but love shrimp and crawdads as we call them here. Anyone growing crawdads successfully? Do they require anything different? what about water flow? does high water flow bother them? I'm still trying to research alot of the questions I have, So I was hoping someone could point me to a post or two with some great info along those lines. Also in a flood and drain system, is there an optimum flood time, or soak time required?

OK sorry for all the dumb questions, Y'all look like a grat bunch and I envy so many of your set ups. I'm gonna start small and work my way up I hope. Thanks in advance! As I start working on a system I'll post pix here and on my website.

Markus
sulphiticfarm.com

Ok just found I missed a whole aset of topics for the formuls LOL, In my excitement I completely missed it, so that question is already answered!

Welcome aanze1313, you have found the right place to learn all you would like about aquaponics. I think there are several members in SC. The inventor of barrelponics has a neat setup in SC. Aquaponic70. http://www.fastonline.org/component/opt ... Itemid,23/
Visit if you get a chance, very cool stuff.

Markus,

Here in central SC doing much the same as you. Looking forward to reading your blog.

Drop me a PM and we can share info/connect.

CB

Welcome,
Yep the Basic info and useful info sections of the forum are relatively quick reads and take care of most of the formula and cycling basics fairly well. Then you get into system design and that gets really fun!!!! Pick a few of the big long threads in Member systems and work your way through them and you may save yourself having to make some of the mistakes yourself.

As for species of critters.
Trout require cool water, high flow rates and plenty of aeration. I don't know how challenging it will be for you to keep the water cool enough through summer there for trout.
As for shrimp and crawdads, they generally need lots and lots of space or they tend to fight and kill each other so that could throw some challenges into the design. Crawdads also tend to be escape artists so you need to escape proof their habitat or you might find poor dried up critters out in the lawn. I don't actually know much of anything specific to growing native crawdads here in the USA though. Freshwater shrimp, well I don't know too much about what types of native fresh water shrimp might be worth trying to grow and eat. I would be interested in such information though if anyone knows of good tasting native fresh water shrimp in the USA. There are giant tiger prawns that could be grown but they require really warm water and still need lots of space (through I think some people grow them out in raft systems under the rafts.) I don't know how hard it would be to get stock of the tiger prawns up in SC though. I can't get them here without an aquaculture permit.

Good luck in your research and looking forward to seeing your system thread in Member systems as you start getting ideas.

Sorry, there is no cure to Aquaponics

Welcome to the Southeast AquaPonic Madness

Hey aanze1313

welcome to the family....

im about 216 miles from you on the coast of NC.. wilmington to be exact....

looking forward to seeing your progress....

jT

WOW !

Thanks for the warm welcome! I had no idea there were so many so close! I'm just below Charlotte NC. Great area. Lived here most of my life. I think this is a great area geographically speaking, Mild'ish winters, hot summers. I'm lucky in that I do have a small creek on my property, I was planning on using the creek to help cool my water if needed during the really warm months, Also my acre is mostly wooded, so plenty of shade too.

That is of course, if I get to building a large system, which , Knowing myself...is possible eventually. I tend to plan small build big, or plan big and scale back...so Always backwards it seems. But I buiild creatively, start one way and it grows or contracts with time, energy and resources available. However, I'm going to build a small test system soon. Probably a barrel type system. I've seen the barrelponics website and think it's awesome.

I feel lucky in that I have alot of wastewater treatment background, from previous employment. Currently working in a network ops center 3rd shift, but it pays the bills.... So my previous experience in both moving water, constructtion of small to medium wastewater treatment systems, design of controls for said watewater treatment systems I hope will give me some background to build off of to help me create a monster system SOMEDAY...not anytime soon though, baby steps right ?

My interests are wide, as is my experience. So I hope to someday be a healthy contributor to the site. Hopefully we can all do well, to help to secure our own personal foodsources, and maybe, if we're lucky, help feed others with healthy and healthful foods. It looks like Aquaponics could be the future of growing healthy food. I'm interested in organic foods.. The way I'm seeing things so far it looks promising to keep things as natural as possible. Personally I hate chemicals, and avoid using them if at all possible. Especially when growing foods. This looks perfect in that one can grow both meat and vegetables, even fruits. So many possiblities!

Again Thanks for the warm welcome!

Yep the barrel ponic manual is a good place to start. Though I'm guessing you might be able to use it simply as a very rough guide since it sounds like the plumbing and water containment parts of the plan are easily up your alley to modify. Barrel ponics manual is actually available for free right on this site too. Look in the downloads/links area I think.
Ok yea there it is.
http://backyardaquaponics.com/pics/barrel-ponics.pdf

Main difference between wastewater and fish keeping is that the fish/bacteria/plants are a bit more specific about the pH they need. Otherwise aquaponics is just a very nice edible version of wastewater treatment

A small system to start is a good idea as it lets you practice cycling and testing on a smaller scale and then can provide gravel and gunk to help you jump start the cycling on your next bigger system.
I personally think that a 300 gallon fish tank is about as small as you want to go for growing out more than a few edible size fish. 300 gallons is kinda nice as it is enough water to be a little more temp stable and likely to be enough water so that your fish are not too cramped in a small tank (I've done some 50 gallon tanks and they are always way too small for anything but fry or very small fingerlings.)

Anyway, great to have you on board.