Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi All
The 5 Kio I have moved into the fish tank…..
They are happy and are eating well even with the water temp this afternoon 15 degrees.
I have been feeding the Kio worms and Kio pellets
The Kio love the worms so I will make that a portion of their diet…
I also added worms into the worm sump………
Took coco coir (photos) and added worms and vermicastings ……
Then this lot I slowly dropped into the water in the one corner of the worm sump…..
At first the worms were reluctant to stay below the water but…..
Checking today I see the worms between the coco coir under the water happy…
The worms in this sump I have started feeding fish food….for now

Hi All
As far as the water parameters I have been checking.
PH 6.8 stable
Temp’s 10-22 deg Celsius
Ammonia not checked
Nitrite 0 to now 2.0+mg/l
Nitrate not checked
Alkalinity 75
Hardness 50
I added shells to the system

9/8

14/8
This is a graph of my bio filter. On the graph I have only logged nitrite…the peak is starting to show

Hi All
Still no media but today I filled plastic baskets with small stones….-+6-10mm.
These baskets I used with my pilot project I have 8 off them…had eight grow trays with my pilot project and I used these to catch solids where my water flowed from the dam into my trays.
In these I want to plant sweet corn and beans in vermi castings directly into the stones and see how they do.
The duckweed in my trays seem to be doing well and the fish are happy…eating.
I have been feeding the fish worms only…my nitrite last reading on Tuesday was 4.0mg/l
I have not checked since…run out of testing tablets…. Test kits are very expensive here
With my pilot project over the last two years I only checked ph alkalinity hardness
The rest I left to the fish to give me a answer…..eating fish are happy fish
Yust me thinking

over the weekend i made this contraption to spread the outflow of water into my
worm/filter

What is the garlic for in the picture at the top of the page?

Hi All

This is a load of vermicastings.
Started this load 11/2010 with paper, a small tree I shredded, and vegetables scraps from a veggies shop every other week.
These castings I now want to remove most of the worms and then use the castings for another veggies project I am trying to get started.
Not much work and the results are good compost.

DéjàVoodoo
i am wanting to grow garlic.

Hi All
Yesterday 80 male tilapia fingerlings I ordered……was delivered. (Hatchery)
I think my timing was bad because since yesterday we have had terrible windy and cold conditions.
I don’t heat water and with these fingerlings arriving now was not a very good idea but…...
Yesterday I introduced them into the system with water temp. +-12 degrees…no choice I had to get them out of the bag they were delivered in.
Very Bad idea, after releasing them in my system and leaving the fish for a short while when I looked again there was +- half of the fingerlings laying on their sides on the bottom of my tank.
I used a net and poked lightly at some of the fish on their sides and saw that when I touch them they would come up straight and swim away. With seeing that they swim again if I help them along I started moving the water in a circular movement in this sq. tank using a paddle. This basically got all the fish moving and surprisingly this revived all of the fish that was on their sides a few minutes ago.
I did this for maybe 5 minutes and it worked. After watching them closely and whenever it looked like one was going down I would help him along. By last night they were all still alive.
Then this morning when I got outside I found 4 fish again on their sides. I tried the same as what I did yesterday and saw that they are still alive. 10 Degrees Celsius
Not wanting to lose these fish I thought well it now or never and I took a bucket and filled it with water from my geyser….and slowly adding to my tank. I raised my water temp with 70 litres of hot water from my geyser.
The Kio in the system were fine and I wanted to feed them. I fed the Kio and I saw that the tilapia are also eating and 60 min ago they were almost dead from the cold water.
Proves once again to me just how hardy tilapia is.
With my pilot Project I used wild tilapia from a dam and never had these problems. They survived these gold conditions. My pilot project records lowest temp. 8 Degrees Celsius.
Hope I can get this lot to survive the cold.
We are starting spring now so our days should get warmer and that will be a great help.

so you say you used the swirl action to revive them and get them going. is there a way to make a swirl action with a pump or a water return?
I have a pump in my tank that its sole purpose is to push water. Its small but effective.

Hi all
Last night after dark I added 26 litre from my geyser for the cold night.
This pushed my temp to 25 deg.
Today this morning I left early still dark so I never checked the fish.
This afternoon when I got home I checked the temp.20 deg.
And....all the fish wanting food....all alive and hungry.
So over night and today I only lost 5 deg

iammr.bill
round dam works the best and makes it easy and if you have a centre outlet …..you don’t ever have to clean that dam again
try use-ing the pump to turn the water slowly in your dam
works well

Hi All
Very sad to say I lost 66 of the male tilapia fingerlings…
To say I really $#@%%^& up and hopefully learned a lesson for the feature
With this now I am reverting to Kio for now, the Kio handle the cold much better.
Kio fingerlings are very expensive if you compare them to tilapia, so I will stock over time.
1 Kio fingerling R15.00 and tilapia male R1.95 …… extra cost to stock my tank.
Yesterday my wife bought me 11 Kio, 4 +-100mm long and 7 +- 45mm long (R500.00)
Now I have 15 Kio and 14 Tilapia in my tank …..
I want to add more Kio as I go along.
I have been feeding the fish Kio pellets and worms.
I feed pellets in the morning and then worms 2/3 times a day.
The duckweed in the bottom grow trays are doing fine and the worms in my filter have settled in.
As for my system goes so far the system has been running no problems and I am very happy.
I still don’t have growing media in my grow trays…. I have not planted plants in the system as yet but I will have to do this in the next few days…. I am not really worried about the nitrates for now.
Water parameters I have not checked for at least +-2 weeks but I believe my filter bacteria is sorted and I have added a bag with shells in the system for the Ph.
Fish are eating so I am happy

Hi all
To tell the truth I never thought me to be very patient.....but with the cycling of my system I find myself being very….. patient.
Surprising taking things slow, not rushing at all and letting the what-knots happen as they have to. (except for my casualties…bad decision dead tilapia)
I have planted a few seeds in 4 of my baskets +- 7 days ago if my memory serves me right.
I sprinkled the seeds between the stones and this is now….cabbage/spinach/lettuce
Using the media in these baskets is something I am thinking of.......the full length of the grow tray’s
Very nice for maintenance if required.
Filling up the rest of the grow tray (between baskets) I will use hdpe machine cuttings....I have been collecting over the last few weeks.
The cuttings are light and very manageable and do the trick.
yust me thinking

spinach

lettuce's

Using the media in these baskets is something I am thinking of.......the full length of the grow tray’s
Very nice for maintenance if required.
Filling up the rest of the grow tray I will use hdpe machine cuttings....I have been collecting over the last few weeks.
The cuttings are light and very manageable and do the trick.
yust me thinking