Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Nice thread CB

One point though, your water inlets to your growbeds will block up and start to flood the surface of the growbeds over time, if you can distribute the water via a pipe with slits cut in it, it works better for longer.

Like this:



Learnt from many overflowing blue barrels worth of experience.

Gonna do a little cleaning and rearranging tomorrow after a bike race. I have family coming into town on Sunday for lunch at my brother's and hoping a few might drift over here to see what I've been doing!



Thanks for that pointer.

I am pondering replacing all the feed plumbing on the big GB side. The 2" outlets from the FT just do not carry as much as it could leaving a good bit of water traveling to the sump overflow... Thinking upping it to a single 3" line for all four beds, then adding your suggested improvement... Need to go research how much more water one 3" pipe can carry over two 2" pipes... (Somewhere I read 'double the size of the pipe to carry 8x the volume', but I want to verify that...)

CB

Correction: double pipe size to quadruple (4X) volume.

CB

Correct. Thats Kudapucats favourite line

Did some cleaning and straightening up today... Figure some family may visit tomorrow... Also, with the warmer weather, I spent a couple hours tightening the plastic on the GH and rolling up the sides... Still in the mid-90s in there, but have the vents and doors closed to retain heat above the plants.

The next couple days will tell the tale with the FT temps. Has been 70º at night and 74-75º in the late afternoon... I really want to see it stay above 73º to insure the tilapia are feeding and growing. Right now the water is too murky to see the bottom and the floating catfish pellets sink.... eventually, so I am not sure how much is being eaten. Nothing coming out of the drains in toe GBs, so it must be going somewhere, but I can't be sure where...

Pics of the sides rolled up...





CB

You know, all that effort you have put into supporting those barrels, could have been spent on IBC's

The barrels were FREE and UV stable....

CB

Cant beat free

Unless your paid to haul them off...

Haven't found that deal on barrels... yet. But when I do, you can bet I'll JUMP! Right now my supplier gives me 10-12 every month... Many more projects ahead for them!!!

CB

hi countryboy i'm in south carolina also,-cowpens sc. and you are in what town??

Winnsboro. 'Nother member on here is from Anderson and I know of a guy from Newberry on the Barrelponics Yahoo forum... We need to have a meet up (or.. meat up if my tilapia are ready... LOL!) in the not too distant future!!

Drop me a PM and we can exchange particulars... You got a system going or researching?

CB

A couple minor additions today..

First a little disappointment... Went in the GH this morning early and some varmint, likely a stray cat had been in one GB and broken a 10" tall cucumber plant off at the base...

Bought some cattle panels today and managed to get a couple into the GH rafters to hang weighted string from for supporting the tomatoes that are about 20" tall now... Still debating replumbing the FT to GB pipes on the one side that seems a little slow... Trying to slow the cash input as I have other projects I want to complete...

Made the purchases today for the NFT pipes over the ST. I'll get them in Thursday as I have a bunch of everbearing strawberries on the way. Gonna use 3" net pots with rock wool and mop wicks to pick up the nutrient.

The temps are supposed to dip dramatically in a couple days and the sides are off the GH!! I have a vinyl sign from a billboard that I folded in half lengthwise then wrapped the FT in it. The exposed side is black, so I hope to collect a little more heat from the sun in the next two warm days before the cool snap, then hope the vinyl acts as a little insulation... Currently, with evenings in the mid-50s and days in the mid-80s the tank fluctuates from 68/69º to 74/75º over the course of the day. I know these fish can survive low 50s, so I'm not worried, but want to keep things as warm as possible to promote growth asap.

Ready for late April early May with more predictable warm weather...

CB

The fish tank is not where most of your heat is lost in an AP system. Insulating it might help a little but most of the heat transfer happens in the flood and drain gravel beds.

I have thought about ways to leave beds constantly flooded during cold nights when I'm trying to maintain water temps but it isn't so easy in my system to do that the way it is set up now. Would be easiest in a system with all bell siphons to simply pull the bells and the beds would be constant flood till you stick the bells back in. This only works if there is ample capacity in the sump for everything to keep operating even with all beds flooded at once.

I have about decided just to shut the whole system off around 6PM and start it back up around 8 AM... The beds will be drained into the ST and the air will stay on in the FT. The stocking density is low enough that the fish will do fine if the water doesn't cycle for 12 hours... (240 tilapia fingerlings and five goldies that are saucer size in 1100 gallons of water.)

More concerning are the 5 tilapia fingerlings in the barrelponics system... They are fast as lightning and I may not be able to catch them to move to the big FT. I can shut that one down as well, but there is significantly less water per goldie than in the big system ('course, I've determined that it is nearly impossible to kill these goldfish!!)... Looks like this will be another learning experience as I look for ways to regulate system temps and adjust for weather fluctuations during the changing of the seasons. By Fall I hope to have several solar water heaters in place and a better way to button the GH up on short notice.... Might be able to add temp to the system easier once I get farther along with my plans to make it grid independent.

CB