Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Huh???

.... think that should be more like 10 tonne a week...

Thought that may have been a typo.

What breed of fish are we talking about? Im assuming they will be breeding in house to be producing those types of numbers in house.... no talapia here

I have been involved with a number of not for profit organisations, millions of dollars don't just appear out of the blue, and most of the members of NFP's are volunteers (unless this is a religious NFP organisation) . Someone is bankrolling it, either the Gov't or people with a lot of 'spare' cash. I don't disagree with it and I would like to see it succeed, but there is going to be a 'profit' for someone.

BTW Huh??? is this a Kiwi mating call

Yeah, sure thing.. someone is bankrolling such organisations.. and they may be "profiting" in some esoteric way... but not finacially.... otherwise it wouldn't be a "not for profit" organisation would it... it would be a scam... a racket...

So the real question is, do we need Aquaponics to be commercially viable? Part of the reason I started was to reduce the distance my food traveled to my plate.

I've been watching this show on GAC (country channel don't know who I ended up there) which is a reality show about a farming family. Non-traditional farmers, in a way because they are not just growing corn or soybeans using petrochemicals and fertilizers and loan debt. But, it is an eye-opening experience. 9 (count em) boys all working 7 days a week on the farm, one week it's drought then the next it's hail. No fun.
http://www.freedomfarmspa.com/#!farm-kings-on-tv/ch0u

How much lettuce would I have to sell to match my current income? Infinity almost. Could I even then take a vacation anywhere for two weeks? No. It takes a special person to buy into that with their eyes open.

Do I think it's good to spend my extra $ on growing my own healthy food, rather than a hobby like golf or skiing or ? You bet.

There aren't any commercial AP operations that are making money solely on fish and plants. It's about training workshops, government grants, or playing a game of "Burn Rate" with the initial capital. I think once the population that might be interested in AP and wants to pay for training has all been trained then some of the commercial places starting up now will hit the wall.

Fair question.... for the backyard.. nah...

For bigger questions of food production, food security... purity of food, food miles, footprint etc.... probably yes...

But that means small scale farmers market models for locavores... or market scale operations... that correspond to current commercial hydroponic operations... to the mass public...

Well I guess there is ?



I 'm sad to say but agree 100 %

The fundamental confu. is indeed for real thoug, no matter reason IMO

The cool thing is, people are interested in doing something ?

And forums like this makes things happen
I think

cheers

NO we don't




Same here

So if we (you/me) sucseed, will that be a threath towards the commercial food producers

hmmm ?

cheers

This was 30 years ago http://pdf.gaalliance.org/pdf/GAA-Serfling-June00.pdf

Not exactly taking giant steps from there

Well this is 6 years ago and roling so IMO things are mowing nicely in a sustainable way (direction)

cheers

Just spit balling here a bit..

10 tonne of fish per week. Assuming they will be grown out to 500g, that will be 20,000 fish harvested per week.

Fast growing saleable fish selections are restricted here to probably trout and barra... both of which would require either heating or cooling in our australian climate. Which is ok for a massive commercial operation I suppose.

Although, a trout for example takes about 4-5 months to reach 500g from fingerling in a backyard scene but lets say on a commercial scale it can be done in 3 months or 12 weeks. Obviously the stocks would be staggered to produce the 20K of fish a week so would it be safe to say this venture would have to hold about 240,000 trout at any one time or nearly half a million tonne to keep the weekly rotation going?

Production would be ball park figure of around 2 million tonne per annum.

Man thats a lot of fish considering that right now, the 3 main commercial salmanidae (atlantic, chinook and rainbow) combined only produce about 1.5 million tonnes annually.... worldwide!

Nooo.. 10 tonne of fish a week..... is roundabout... 500 tonne a year...

Not 2 million tonne....

My bad...

My maths are as poor as my spelling I suppose

Even still... Id hate to be on the filleting knife