Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi food and fish. I had a quick look at the sight you mentioned. Which pump am I best to get. they have a 70L/min with 10 outputs ($55) or a 90L/min ($70). Is there such a thing as too much air?

Not really.... and you can always plug off any unwanted outlets... or put adjustable taps on them in order to control the flow...

As Rupt said

I have looked at the sight you recommended Fish&food. Has anyone had any experience with the automatic top up kits?. I am thinking of setting something up so I don't have to worry about the levels in summer. What does everyone think?

fish are all still healthy...no new deaths....other than dinner tonight They seem to be all around the same size around 250grams. Other people's trout seem to be a lot bigger. I guess the size of mine is due to the reduced feeding levels being a new system. We have just ticked over the six month mark. I have been surprised at how little work is involved in maintaining the system. I need to become better at managing the plant side of things. Learning how to underplant so I always have new plants coming up to replace the old.

Hehehe
FRC _ yeh planting... that is the key, and why we have fish

Well I have connected a retic tubing to "water" one of my growbeds (pots) standpipe to do the topping up for my 2nd system. Not worked out whether it is doing its job yet, but it is one crude way of doing it... I will be adjusting the retic station timer to the required fill time.

I used the working from the inside of a toilet cistern - it works great and I have not had to top up my system once since installing it
its on page 77 of "Aquamads second system" viewtopic.php?f=18&t=574&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&start=1140

Yesterday I found a dead yabby in the system. did a water test and the ammonia level was 1 and nitrite .25. I increased the feeding rate a few days ago. I didn't feed the fish today as I am planning on harvesting all of the trout tomorrow. I have access to 70 - 200mm barrumundi on thursday. I am a bit worried that my water temps aren't high enough. My husband made a simple pipe water heater to place on the shed roof. Hopefully that will raise the temperature a bit. Today the temperature in the morning was 17 1/2 degrees, by late afternoon it was 23 degrees (with ice added at 3pm). What does everything think? I don;t want to miss out on getting the fish as they have been hard to source. Will have to wait and see what happens.

The plant growth in the system has been fantastic. I am going to have to spray for caterpillars for the first time. I will try and source some dipel tomorrow.

IMO... 17.5 is too low to ensure their survival... especially if they're coming from a supplier that's been holding them at 24-26 degrees...

Getting the tank up to 23 during the day is fine... but keeping it there overnight is the dilemna...

And how much filtration do you have now... you started with thre 500L growbeds...

You might be pushing the limits with 70 Barra and only that much filtration...

Especially given the feed rate you'll be throwing at the Barra, and growth rates... within a short period of time...

I thought you were supposed to have 25 fish per BYAP grow bed. Is that the wrong number? Yes rupert I still only have three 500L growbeds. How many barra would you suggest?

Is there any simple way of heating the water for the next couple of weeks? I know that you can buy aquariam heaters....but I don't think they will make much difference to a 2000L tank.

Hi Sarah,
Yes 20-25 fish per growbed should be fine and that is based on advanced fingerlings of around 100ml and growing them out to around 500g.
If they are in fact up to 200ml as long as you have plenty of plants you should be fine.
I was worried when I got my barramundi that the temp at night was too cold. At 3am I went and checked and it was around 17 degrees. Of course it is not their optimum temp but they did survive. I just wish I had a crystal ball to see what the weather is going to do. My water temp this morning at 8-30 am was 22 degrees.
I haven't seen a weather report so I am not sure what the forecast is for the coming week.

Hi Faye
Thanks for responding. My water this morning was 22degrees as well. Have you got your barra this season already...or are you talking about last years barra?

Last years barra is what I was talking about.

It would be bad to get barra too early, especially if the weather turns like last year.