Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hello All!

Our (my wife and I) first experience with Aquaponics was watching a PBS (Public Broadcasting System) show called "Food Forward". We saw an Aquaponic setup a community had made in Detroit, MI and a number of other urban farming systems. While we (mostly she) tries to grow as much produce as we can in our back yard, we've found it difficult with the climate and soil here in North Texas.

I'm originally from San Francisco and my wife is from Southern Germany so we've never had to deal with the gooey, concrete-like soil they call clay here. I'm not sure if many people here in the US realize how far south our country goes relative to the rest of the world, but Dallas, TX (near where we live) is roughly along the same line of longitude as Morocco in North Africa. Sooo, that explains the heat.

I've already got our system started with a 100 gallon Rubbermaid livestock water tank as the FT and a 50 gallon version of the same as the GB (hopefully I'm using the proper acronyms as I've lurked on this forum for a while). I have to say those containers are pretty damned bulletproof. The media in the GB is some lava rock and small river rock at the bottom and the rest filled in with expanded shale. The hydroton clay balls my wife is familiar with was way too expensive compared to the expanded shale. It's a flood and drain system with a bell siphon (which I think is the coolest thing).

Right now we've got about 20 goldfish swimming around in the FT since they're cheap and tough for the most part. We have planted some lettuce, beets, and string beans (I think, I leave the planting choices for my wife, who's the chef).

I had taken some pictures of my set-up but they're on 4 different devices so it may be a little bit before I get some posted.

So I look forward to producing some epic failures as well as a few triumphs as long as we all learn a little something more along the way!

Cheers!

Howdy Ron...

Now I get the name thing...

Good to hear you have a system, already set up.

Great welcome to the forum. I am about 2 hours south of you. Dealing with the heat is always an issue.