Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Wow... luv ya work Tom..

Not a bad idea.. pizza ovens are pretty handy we dont just use them for pizzas but also great for smoking and slow cooking stuff...fits a hell of a lot too

Thanks.. although I'll be stressed when I have to do it AGAIN at my own place one day...first I have to get my own place though

Excellent work, pleasure to see the photos. Will download today. Cheers.

Every time I buy something I come across something afterwards in this forum that I would rather have bought...examples:
1) Resun ac/dc backup 5 lpm air pump ....THEN i read that there is a BOYU 27 lpm ac/dc pump for not much more money....to make things worse i bought a 240v Boyu air pump the other day (30lpm) because i didnt think the little Resun backup will be enough when I get my fish
2) Boyu 6000lph pond pump...THEN I come across their ECO range that draws a third of the watts... looks like I will have a lot of backup/spare air and sump pumps

Isnt his pretty much the rule of life...damn capitalist/western minds, we should be ashamed of ourselves

Ok so when I am done cycling towards end of Dec i will need to get some fish. Originally I was planning on 40 Jade perch but now I am leaning towards 40 Barramundi as summer is starting and they are supposed to be a summer fish. Now I have read through a lot of posts in the forum and thought that the 40 Barra are an achievable type/quantity for my system but I would love for anyone to pipe up and throw a spanner in the works as I welcome criticism.
Heres a recap of my system-
- 1000 liter FT
- 3 x 30cm deep IBC GBs
- 3 x sumps under each GB at apporx 600 litres each ( why you ask well they were left overf rom the GB and I couldnt fit more GB anywhere)
- the system is CF and the pump is probably moving over 4000 litres per hour and I have 2 airators, 30 lph and a backup 5 lph

I have already planted lots of greens and they are growing well.. the only worry I have is that I may not have enough bio filtration from the plants... but at the same time i figure the fish will be small for a while and not make too much waste and kind of grow somewhat in unison?

Spoken to a couple of members who have gone away from the barra, water turns cold before they are a good size and the tank will need heating. Jade perch are now available from SE QLD hatcherys at Beenleigh.

well maybe I will have to go back to jade perch as they are meant to tolerate the temperature ranges better... maybe I should wait with Barra until the system has been running a while, then perhaps I could introduce barra fingerlings into one of my sump tanks earlier in the season if its warm to grow them longer. I certainly dont want to be heating water as it seems a bit of a waste of resources.. Thanks

Ok so I have been planning Stage 2 and Stage 3 of my system.
Stage 2 as I have it planned so far is an NFT system along one of my walls... now I would probably prefer to just have more grow beds but space does not permit so the only place to go is up.
Stage 3 is going to be strawberry towers

I made this diagram today to get some feedback from you guys about possible problems I may have.. I have been reading a bit about other peoples successes and failures so the key points I am trying to keep in mind are as follows:
- FILTRATION: my NFT will take water from my sump so hopefully this will have clean enough water as the 3 GBs each have a sump underneath them which are plumbed together and the pump is in the third one. I may put in a swirl filter later if There is clogging in any of the NFT components as this seems to be a common failure point.
- FLOW: I am planning to use 40mm PVC to supply water which is branched to 25mm ball valves (regulate flow individually for each four rows) the water will exit into 25mm pipe which then dumps into a larger 40mm pipe to then feed back to sump using gravity. I plan to have the system working as a constant flow with a height in each pipe of approx 10-20mm. I am unsure if i should slope the PVC pipe slightly? and if so how much? I will supply the wather into the pipe at a higher point than it will exit.
- PLANTS: I mainly want to use the NFT for lettuce and greens like that so hopefully I will not have as many problems with the roots blocking pipes etc. I plan on buying pots (probably 75mm hydro ones) and adding a wik made from something like a mop head so that I can plant seeds directly into NFT system and avoid nursery stage.
- MAINTENANCE: I want to be able to guite simply dismantle the system for cleaning ( hopefully not very often but who knows) so I am using barrel unions so that I can break down the system into smaller simpler to clean parts.
- HEAT: I have read that this kind of piping with not too much water and less flow can heat the water somewhat, but I am hoping that since it is in my greenhouse I can easily shade the piping in summer where needed. Also my fish tank is 1000 litres and my 3 sumps have a combined total of about 1800-2000 litres so I figure they will control fluctuations... i hope

the 3 images attached show my plans in more deatils.. the first image is the entire system but the text is not legible at such a low resolution so I also attached to more images which act as closups of the first image..still not very high quality when limited to 800x600 wish I could attach a PDF..

Well if anyone has suggestions about week points or anything please let me know... especially about the FLOW and how my ball valves will work etc..

Here is an image to illustrate where the NFT would be positioned in relation to rest of system...its all a tight squeeze... i wont be able to get fat

Great effort Tom. Having grown Barra (and other fish) for now over 4 years I think this is my last year for Barra. Even down here with solar heaters etc it is an effort to keep the temps up. I would stick with the Jades for your first batch they are pretty hardy and will handle the temp range we have. At present trying out Murray Cod to see how they go.

Thanks Chainsaw, seems like good advice since I have never kept fish in anything bigger than an 8 litre fish bowl and unfortunately 2 of the guppies in there died the other day... i think they were victims of bullying by the bigger more colourful guppies.. so Jades seems like a better starting point perhaps

Well i thought I would post my water test results...exciting well for me anyhow

Here are the images of the sliding shade cloth I made, now it will be easy to remove it for winter etc. I used wire and punched eyelets into the shade cloth that slide along the wire and sowed in two lengths of timber at each end 186 cm wide.
I also used some 19ml irrigation hose cut along one side and riveted over the edges of the IBC grow beds to prevent the plant stems from be snapped by the eventual tonnes of produce that will be hanging from them.
And I installed a flashing LED strobe light on the roof of my greenhouse which automatically turns on when the backup system is activated... now we can check it from the verandah or the neibours can keep an eye on it for us more easily.
Also my dad has installed 3 LED lights so now I dont have to stumble around during the night time with a torch if something goes wrong. Thanks dad!