Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Our neighbor go an old beat up galvanized stock tank that he decided he didn't really have a use for so he dropped it by to us. Has a bunch of bullet holes that need patching. Apparently some one thought it would make a good object for target practice, I guess the side of the barn must have been too big so they moved on to the more advanced 7 foot stock tank.
Anyway, they are small holes so should be fairly patchable.

Since this will be for a duck aponics system, I figure the galvanized tank should be ok in this situation. It will also be running some gravel beds with shells so the pH will stay high. Also since it is a duck system and warm blooded poo is not such a good idea for growing food in close contact, I'll be growing mostly trees in this system or fodder crops for the ducks and chickens.

The initial grow bed is going to be something of a gravel filled sump bed that will grow a line of bananas and papayas.

Will see how it goes. I've been sick of dumping the duck water and just re-filling, hopefully I can manage enough filtration to save a fair bit more water as well as grow some more useful plants.

This may also be a good system for some experiments that I don't want to try directly on my catfish system or just testing out other ideas that might not be convenient with a system with fish in it.

Let the fun begin (Told ya I never stop.)

And in your spare time you are going to

LOL, start a new business

This morning, I got het to stop for an hour or so, to show me around....
'Thanks' TC...everthing is looking nice !

Excellent... I wonder how some of the other old duckaponic systems are going, Like duckpond and Ev.

I think I've figured that ducks produce something like 5x as much waste per lb as fish, but what proportion goes into the water? I was also thinking that the duckpond size does not really matter; just size the sump to fill all growbeds and sluice that sucker through the pond once every hour or two....

Looking forward to your results....

At least with a duck system, you don't have to be as worried about the waste hurting the ducks. My main goal is to keep the system from stinking and wasting water. which the current "duck pools" do.

Exactly.

As far as growing things, how about corn? It may enjoy your summer heat and you cook it before eating....

I might try it (corn) sometime. However, the current duck set up allows the birds access to not only the pond but also the grow bed. They have already started eating the banana plants that the cook moved into the grow bed for them. Hopefully a few of them can take off before they are totally decimated. The birds love eating the leaves and they will even mine a banana stump if it's been cut off (like after a freeze.)

A few of the ducks were having fun playing in the grow bed today as we haven't finished filling the gravel bed so there was standing water above the gravel in areas. They were wading in the water and rooting around in the gravel with their bills and picking up rocks to see if they were worth trying to eat. (They will play with an acorn for hours trying to break it open I guess.) Pretty fun to watch. They haven't discovered the Pond (stock tank) yet. They will have to learn to walk up the ramp to it since it's 2 foot high.

I'm also thinking about adding some worm beds to this system since I don't need to be as worried about turning the water dark. Perhaps also testing some alternative medias that I wouldn't want to use with fish.

I'm not sure what you can grow if they have access to the bed. Years ago we had ducklings that "weeded: the strawberries, then they learned about ripe berries, then ate them less ripe, then white, then green, then flowers. I tried a filter for our pond and grew watercress in it. One side covered, one side not. Not a root or shoot survived in the uncovered bed, but that may have been because it was flowing water a couple cm deep: irresistible.

Do your ducks get into the fish tanks at all TC? My muscovies used to make a big racket when they got into the fish tank, freaked the fish out, they wouldn't eat for days..

No all my fish tanks are covered and then I also had to add a fence around the 300 gallon tank to keep them off the cover as well. Before I set up the 300 gallon system, the cover over the quarantine tank wasn't so good and I found a couple of the ducks sitting in a few inches of water over the cover so I had to add something to keep them off that too.

I don't want them in the fish tanks, the fish would never forgive me.

We might have to add some movable fencing around some things in the duck system just so they can stay ahead of the birds to provide more fodder for later.

However, the cook came home yesterday with a bunch of pond plants. Some of which will not be named as they are invasive. I'm kinda hoping the ducks and chickens eat all the invasive ones before we get caught with them.

I'd better get the camera out tomorrow and get some pictures of the duck system. Saddly the birds did go after their banana plants pretty quickly so they are looking kinda tattered. Both the ducks and chickens seem to like eating water plants too.

I'm testing out a worm bin idea to go along with this system using one of the old leaky lumber/liner grow beds from the old quarantine system. It is now filled with wood chips/leaf mulch and it floods and drains. I'm going to move a layer from the worm bins out to it and see how quickly the flood and drain action along with the worms will turn the chips into compost.

It will also be interesting to see where the pH on this system balances since the wood chips/leaves will have a pH lowering effect while the shells in the gravel bed (used the media from the old quarantine system in the gravel bed) will help keep the pH up and since the "pond" won't really be covered to protect it from light, I expect a certain amount of algae and there are also three tubs with pond plants currently hooked up with this system too. When I ran a pH test on the system today, I was a little suprized that the pH was only 7.6 since I had topped up the system with well water quite a bit because of some tinkering having lost some water.

So the almost baseline tests (I say almost because the gravel was a bit gunky when it went in and the ducks have already been swimming.)
pH 7.6
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 0 (I would have expected something here just from the gunk and the dirt the pond lillies are planted in.)
I suppose the pond plants (especially the floating ones not to be named) are very efficient at using up nutrients.

Ok I got pictures

This is located out back past the new 300 gallon system. Took over one garden bed to put in the gravel bed and the tank is near the old chicken coop in back.

oops forgot this picture earlier