Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Just a quick update on the system so far.

The trout are doing well in the tank though I only see them at feed time. The IBC that they are in is black in colour and because it has the raft tank on top the water is quite dark. However when I take the cover off the trout begin to school in the upper portion of the tank awaiting some feed.

I'm thinking of adding a 12v pond light to the tank which can be turned on to 'inspect' the fish.

The raft tank is coming along really well with the lettuces picking up speed. The gravel grow beds are holding their own however due to the cold weather in this part of the world the growth isn't startling. However the cabbages are forming hearts nicely and everyone seems pretty happy.

Water quality has stayed pretty stable with a moderate rise in ammonia as the fish came in, and a slight rise in nitrite and nitrate. pH has been very stable, and the TAN is well within the safe range.

I'm feeding once a day and going through about 200g feed per week. I am using the water monitoring to tell me when to increase the feed so as to add to the system in ratio to the bacterial colony growth. Does this seem like a reasonable approach?

All in all I am reasonably happy with the system so far, and am looking forward to expanding it further (perhaps into a greenhouse like Bradford has done). I'll put up a new video on my website this evening.

Cheers
Shane

Sound terribly organised to me Shane, pictures would be nice

A further update on the system.

The cold weather was definitely a challenge for the plants with the grow beds hardly growing at all over winter. The lettuces in the raft tank, despite having a frost cover over them, were still too exposed so all the leaves they valiantly grew (and they did try hard) were burnt off by frost very quickly.

On the positive side, the trout loved the colder weather and have been doing very well. Water temperatures got down to 4.1 degrees celcius but spent most of the winter at 6 degrees. The rainbows didn't mind at all... after all, this is most agreeable to their species.

Over the last couple of weeks we have had warmer weather, and light frosts, so the water temperature has rise to 12 degrees and the fish are eating a lot more. The plant growth has also increased markedly... you can almost watch the peas grow over a cup of tea.

My only concern is that the fish didn't grow as much over winter as I had hoped so am concerned about harvestable size as the temperature increases. To give me some more time I am planning on moving my fish underground in the next month or so, and perhaps setting up an 'earth tube water conditioning system' to moderate the water temperature. This would consist of between 100-200m of buried pipe which the water returning to the fish tank (from the grow beds) would pass through. It will hopefully help to stabilise the water temperature in both seasons.

I am also building a prototype day feeder which will dispense 4 feeds to the fish each day whilst I am at work (without risking malfunction that could feed them a weeks feed at a time). Once I have the prototype working, in the next couple of weeks, I'll post more details for others.

And yes... eventually I will get around to photos... I a useless sod! :-)

Cheers
Shane

How big are they? My veg also hibernated most the winter. The minus 8 degree nights doing nothing to help. Like you, they have picked up with the slightly warmer weather. I'm nowhere near 12 degrees though.

What plants are you growing Shane? How about cabbages, beets, cauliflower etc? Is it still to cold for them in your area?

G'day Gents

Over winter I had english spinach, kale and cabbage in the beds, and added the peas as the weather began to warm a little. All of these survived the frosts but it was too cold for them to put on much growth at all... far too cold. One of the joys of living in the ACT Region is that almost everything stops growing through winter. I say almost everything as the only plant I have seen continue to grow is Tree Lucerne (Tagasaste) though, being a small tree, I don't grow that in my grow beds. :-)

Next year I'll have a polyhouse up to get me through the winter.

The fish are about 5-6 inches long at the moment from nose to tip of tail. I'm actually planning to take a sample for weighing on the weekend.

I'm also extending the system into a new bed. I had originally planned this bed to be a flood & drain gravel bed but miscalculated when developing the design. My sump isn't big enough to allow me to run the bed as a flood & drain. So I have decided to create a giant DWC bed, 5m x 1m... that's a LOT OF LETTUCE!! :-)

Cheers
Shane

You can also just run it flood & flood =)

Lots of people (including myself) have no problems with a growbed constantly filled with water. Though DWC will save you the cost of the gravel, give it a red hot go and let me know how it goes.

Well the DWC is up and running though there is still a little more work to 'finish it off'. I have popped up a youtube video of the system and will be adding short 'additions' over the next 4-6 weeks to see how it goes, and the development of the greater system.

You mention using "copper tape"... just make sure any water that might come into contact with the tape.. can't find it's way into the DWC bed.. and through to the fish tank...

I agree wholeheartedly, and the application of the copper tape will be on next weeks instalment. In the meantime this weeks instalment... :-)

I review all the beds and look at the new toteponics fish tank set-up.

Hey Shane, I noticed earlier you mentioned you might put in a 12V pond light. Be careful, I put one in my tank and after about 12-24 months I pulled it out and the whole thing just fell apart. A lot of the casing had disintegrated, I was left with the sealed globe hanging by it's wires and a skeleton of the casing hanging off it. Losing the light didn;t bother me too much, but the fact that whatever it was made from had dissolved into the water of the system wasn't a nice thought.

Thanks for the notice... I agree wholeheartedly. I certainly don't want a light dissolving into the water which feeds the plants, the fish and ultimately me. :-) Actually I am still thinking of the light but not putting it into the water. I am rather now thinking of building in a string of LED lights around the cage of the tank covered with reflective film. The lights should be able to shine through the translucent sides of the tank.

In reality, the new tank arrangement doesn't really need a light but that doesn't mean I'm not going to play around with them anyhow... :-)

Hey Shane,

Looks great - did you use "Bungendore Brown" as your media? A bit of a protein scum around the thermometer, keep an eye on it! Have a look for some uneaten food or something else breaking down somewhere in the system.

12.2 overnight is fantastic! Nice one. Are you not pumping overnight or something?