Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi Faye,
Your right the clear tubs are pretty schmick!
We have no algae issues with them, i have truly no idea why or how, the tanks on the other hand made pea soup look like lolly water.
Getting them out of the GH and alongside the house has made all the difference.
One of those pieces of advise i should have listen to at the start.
Actually i think it was you and Charlie that i should have listened to!!

Maybe i should have read this earlier! found at our local library! Love it!

Hi Charlie! Mate i love getting over to look at your system, i have to say though, that Joe Blake you have around your neck....not cool!!!

Well it was a long fishless week, but we are back from Maldon.

Everyones seen SP's but hey, they are the cutest at this age! and my first so its good fun!

15 SP's and 5 Tandus Tandus.

They came with stern warning, don't touch them bare handed, apparently their barbs are painful even at 3-4cm!

They are a little bit lost in there but i guess will grow quick enough.

The Yabbies, although lived with the trout peacefully enough were relocated, much to their chargrin.

Again thanks to Rick from CVFWF Farm in Maldon, always a pleasure.

Love your photos Porter and I love those cool catfish, we have a couple here in a Balcony system and they are interesting to say the least. Yesterday I caught them canoodling I think. We have had them a few years now, pretty slow growing.

Hi Faye! sorry i caught your post about that in my other thread and meant to get back to you on it.

How big are they now? any pics!!!
Have you had any spine issues when handling them?
Can i ask what your feeding them?

Thanks!!

We have never had to handle the catfish so spines have not been a problem. We feed all the fish the same food, Skrettings floating pellets. I will endeavour to get some pics or video

Thanks Faye!
Photos/vids would be fantastic!

Regards

Ok, right, busy day yesterday.

I have always felt that there was more room to expand with this system, and that the 400Ltr sump was a waste of water, sitting there doing relatively nothing at all.
So we are now set up for two fish tanks from one pump.
There is a history to this re-build and some thanks well deserved, and i will get that up shortly, but for now here are the photos.
It hasn't been tested yet and today is out,
As such on Monday I will silicone the aquabridges in and on Tuesday we will switch it on and see if theory works in practice.
But it came up alright, everything fitted according to plan.

With the Perch in one tank (and new cat's soon) the decision as to what to put in the second tank is now up for discussion.

The rear filter will act as a solids/sump to eliminate some of the particles that are still working their way in from the grow beds, and the forward filter will continue to act as my bio-filter.

I still didn't get the new grow beds in, so again they have to wait for the next weekend.

But nearly there.

So now we can move from one, to two tanks on the same single pump.

We also fitted the airlift,

40mm Elbows fitted with a 40-25mm reducer into the 25mm pipe. Twin air hoses into each, without air stones.

At the moment, its lifting 10ltrs every 30-35seconds, but there is definitely more in it.

We went with the smaller diameter because of the shallow depth of the tank.

But its performing very well.

Rick at CentralVic Freshwater Fish is very good value I think. I got the same warning about the catfish.

Is that a Growfresh GH you have? I've got their 4300 series to put up. Your layout has me thinking now - I will probably still have the FT in the GH because I want to grow warm species all year round, but I've also got a cover and insulation for an IBC so I might experiment with that and see how effective it is at reducing temp swings.

How high is the verticals at the side of the GH? Not sure which pieces are my side pieces but I think they look about 1.5m high going up to a 2.5m roofline in the centre. Does that sound about right? I'll go open the package properly later and measure them - if I can get a row of those containers along one side I might have to change my layout a bit.

Great system you have going there - those smaller tubs are a good idea for growing different things - I might invest in some to add variety to the IBC GB's.

As from the other thread, so far *touch wood* my cats and SP's are getting along. I'll have to look for my little set of scales and see how much feed I'm giving them. I mix the sinking small pellets with some larger floating ones - they don't do the floaters straight off but it seems to give them grazing during the day and overnight - when I go to feed them next, the floaters are gone.

I feed morning and evening. I don't have a SLO as it's ust a simple IBC system at present, and the wastes accumulate a bit on the bottom - I was thinking I was overfeeding but I'd rather clean the tank every so often than have the little buggers go to war on each other.

The water is still testing out just fine and they're all zipping along happily (as in not panicked) so s'all good so far.

Back to you - how is the GH for keeping a good temp? Did you get the auto-vent system with yours and is it useful? I got the shade system for mine as well - Bendigo temps in summer would provide cooked fish I think without it. I went for the 75% shade version.

G’Day Mate,

Yeah, Rick’s fish have been brilliant, I think I will stick with him for a bit, his prices always seem fair to me and only an hour(ish) up the road.

My greenhouse is a Sproutwell, the same size by the look of it, we are stoked with it.
Yeah, I see where you are coming from for warm weather stocks in winter, we have some ideas for the same but it would mean another do-over and after the yellowpages incident, I dare not ask!

The only change I would make would be that I wouldn’t make the same mistake twice with an uncovered FT in the GH, algae hurt us very badly. But lessons learnt the hard way are rarely repeated.
I would have to weigh the cost of a re-build verse stock numbers and production etc.

I will get back to you at lunch with that measurement, but I daresay your right. The legs on GB frame are 1000mm, so I reakon your 1500mm is spot on.

I bought my tubs from Ballarat Material and Equipment Handling, all food grade and around $22.50ea. http://bmhe.com.au/products/plastic-sto ... ers/crates
I am going up again later next week to get the last ones I need for the GB extension.

The tandus came as a shock! I was under the impression that if anything it would have been the other way around! But I will end up getting more.
If Rupert is right, maybe the silvers were hungry??

I just need to work out how to co-species for the second FT, any ideas?
I have just been using the feed supplied by Rick.

Trout are definitely on the cards, i mean where the hell has summer gone???

The GH temps are really good, I haven’t fitted the auto-openers, mainly because if time, so I just open the vents after I feed the fish depending on the weather of thee day.
But I must get them put in.
I fitted fly wire to the openings the other day, bloody white moths, green caterpillars everywhere!
I am going to fit hinges to the doors to, sick of them getting caught and debris etc, but again, that's a job for another day!

Regards

Ooh... flywire. Great tip! I'll take a good look at my doors as I build the GH - the pics make the sliders look pretty much enclosed and I hadn't thought about stuff getting in there. Might rig a cover over the top ones if it isn't protected.

If there's an issue with one lot eating another, how about some plastic fly wire in a vertical barrier in the FT - keep them off each other? I've been thinking about that for a while, more because some of the fish I'd like to try will eat anything they can catch - even the young I think. I figured maybe a 3 bladed vertical barrier - very small mesh so even fingerlings can't get through - just have to make sure to get food distribution right.

yeah, i will grab a pic of the fly wire for you, i just used the bunnings special and the 6mm version of the same tubular thingy that you use on the fly wire doors, and just pushed it into the gap provided.
Works a treat.
The doors will eventually get the same treatment.

I had considered a divider!!!!
A fitted pvc frame with that gutter guard stitched across it.
they are a 10mm x 10mm gap, so it wouldn't catch solids along the bottom and hopefully small enough to to keep fingerlings in.
But i have some bowing in my tanks so i have to organise the frame to straighten them out first.
Its the only thing that has stopped me going it really.

I am going to make some yabbie cages for the bottom in a similar manner.
and one in the other tank for the fresh water mussel.

Let me know how you go!!!

I don't think I've ever had fresh water mussels - any good?

There's a yabbie guy down around the Grampians - offers 10's 100's or 1000's so clearly a large operation. Figured when I was ready I'd head down there for some.

The alternative to trapping fingerlings in their section is to let them roam but have several different size mesh barriers - biggies can't get at the medium size and mediums can't get at fingerlings - I'm just not sure if fish are smart enough to head back through the mesh to survive.

Oh... how did you go with the GH build? I figure I will try it by myself with the missus to hold up ends where needed. Were your instructions good? I looked at mine and went and downloaded a video of the Growfresh guy building one.

http://www.aquablueseafoods.com.au/other-mussels.shtml this is the link i used to get them,
funny little critters, they are doing great. Spins people out when i point them out,
They are meant to be great breeders so we will see how they go over the year.
(same place we got the yabbies from) but if there are some closer then good news!!
but then i guess its fuel/time v postage!!

I managed to build the GH almost by myself, it was the roof beam that I required the extra hands for mainly.
I had some garden stakes and cord to assist the holding of each wall up, so that was handy.
Just banged the pegs in to form an A-frame at each end of the wall and tied each wall off as it was needed.
The instructions were pretty good actually, videos supplied to!

We positioned ours behind the house and positioned the doors away from the north/south winds because they wind can be brutal here.