Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

As requested I have added my system into the members area. Please find the initial pictures attached and I will post some more in the coming days once I get a chance

Firstly I would like to thank the people involved in the several hundreds of posts I have read over the past few months to generate my interest in Aquaponics. I was looking for something fun for the family to do in the evenings together and my young children love fish. We are based in Point Cook in Melbourne, Victoria.

So against some peoples posts I decided on a sub surface continuous flow system that feed from the bottom up and after some testing and modifications have a working system that pumps about 850L an hour.

System Updates from my initial post.
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I added 2 aerators into my design with one being battery backup on power fail.

UV light is currently disconnected as I can't seem to get agreement on using it within the forum posts I have read.

My systems Ph was at 9.2 after week 1, and I tried reducing this by using hydrochloric acid as per a members suggestion but it would drop to 6.9 and then rise back to 9.2 after a few hours so I stopped after a two treatments when other members suggested to hold out. At week 4 (3 weeks after the hydrochloric adjustment) I now have the opposite with the pH at 6.0 but will wait a few more weeks to see if it has stabilised. Experiment suggests it naturally reduced over time, or suspect that the acid took a while to activate through the system.

The nitrates are showing at 40-50mg, but still taking a few days for the ammonia to drop back so imagine a few weeks of cycling to go.

I have added about 30 various size yabbies (a gift from a mate, so added them anyway even though not cycled) with heaps of pvc pipe (16-100mm dia) for them to hide in the bottom, I was thinking of laying sum mesh before the fish to protect them further but haven't decided on this yet. The yabbies have been eating carrot as this was suggested as the best feed on some aquaculture sites and unless others disagree thought it wouldn't effect the system too much (they seem to really love it). They are all getting along fine as it is constantly dark because of my lid on the FT and having places to hide so having a high stocking level of them seems to be fine for now.

Water is crystal clear, no algae or slimy residue on the tank.

The megabins/deep gravel have been successful i feel in controlling temp. The temp of the water has had minimal variation and guessing the gravel has taken some of the temp out of the water during the hottest part of the day and released in slowly in the cold nights.

Plants are growing well, with tomato and strawberry fruit are already growing.

The pump flow needed to be increased as it began to cycle (guessing as the filter became fuller) but still have plenty of pump capacity for second system.

My little 18 month old bloke carries his chair out to the tank and beds EVERY night yanking my arm to check it out so most importantly the project is a success in my eyes

Wonderful set up you have designed TQ!

Love the maxitubs, we have some of those at work that I walk past every day used for storing cable. Good stuff.
So to sum up you have around 1500L of GB and 750L of FT. From what I understand it is a CF system but Im a little unsure of how you have plummed it exactly, what is it you mean when you say pumped from the bottom and does the pump from the FT pump to the far GB which flows to to the middle GB which then flows to the FT? Sorry for Q's just trying to get the full picture.

Cheers mate

thanks,

The water pumps into the GB from the bottom and flows out at about 50mm from the top.

The water pumps from the FT into each GB individually and then flows back out of the GB back into the FT. The top of the diagram shows inflow to the beds and the bottom of diagram shows outflow.

I heart megabins, sweet setup 3"s

Very neat setup Threequote! Great to see the family loving it too

Looking good Threequotes, have you thought about how you are going to clean out the roots from your inlet pipe into the Growbeds, or are you hoping they are going to be low enough in the gravel that the roots won't make it down that far?
Those Tubs really do look good.
Wavey.

not sure how far they will go down but will soon see i guess, i have a wet dry vac that i can use to suck up the clay pellets and then pull them from the gravel if need be. The inlet pipe itself has a stainless steel screen i can remove as well.
the beds are fairly deep so not sure how far the various roots grow and because it is constantly flooded not sure if they will bury so deep.

Plants 4.5 weeks

More plants 4.5 weeks

tank

the tank looks half full but is actually 2/3rds to 3/4 full.

Very nice.
In the pics everything looks very green, are you supplementing with anything?
Iron Chelate or Seasol etc.?

Those bins are very cool

i put two teaspoons of seasol on day one and two and that is it their has been half a handful of urea going in when needed for cycling which is been converting to ammonia.

Just watch the quantity of urea you add... especially when you get close to fish...

It can take a couple of days to show fully as ammonia... and if you add too much will actually inhibit the cycling...

i actually slowed it anyway cos of the 30 yabbies. i will see how it goes over the next week or should i stop completely and stop the fishless cycling because of the yabbies?

thanks for the tip though, i appreciate it.