Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

What did you end up doing with those 500 gallon tanks? The reason I ask is cause Im going to be using something similar to those that I found on a website. I would love to see with pics what you did with them

Nicky, I still have one of the two 500-gallon tanks and have not done anything with it yet, although I've slated it for rainwater (creek water) storage. The other 500-gallon tank I traded with a guy I connected with via Craigslist, for a 425-gallon conical-bottom tank that I plan on using as an uber-swirl filter. I don't have it set up yet because it's metal stand needed repair, so that's at the metal shop at the highschool near me, and the teachers are going to fix it for me.

I'm seriously thinking of adding my 300-gallon horizontal tank to my current setup in Frisco, but the school is thinking of expanding the system we've built there to include it, and I'll certainly let them if that's what they decide to do. I still need to get around to repairing my 1000-gallon tank that has the forklift-punctured base, and I sold the 3500-gallon tank to Parker and the guys from Aledo along with all that stuff late last year (sold them one 12,000-gallon tank, am lending them another, for example).

Unless I'm forgetting something, all I have left besides the above is an ever-increasing bunch of totes, that last 12,000 gallon monster I've got in storage in Carrollton, and more barrels than I care to count.

Let me know if you need anything, and we can maybe make a deal. I'm also (I hope - I may be flattering myself here) known for sometimes just giving away equipment when it is in my way, or I haven't decided what to do with it.

Here's a not-very-good picture (but the best I could manage) of the bulk of my Tilapia babies.



Also, here's two of my three "mystery tilapia" - fingerlings of mysterious origin (I'm not sure if I bred or bought these, but nonetheless the huge mystery is "how in the world did they end up in a barrel I had just cleaned and refilled, since there's no way they could have fit through the hose much less the pump?")



Oh well, "alive" is "alive", and that's a huge plus around here recently!

I should probably mention that in light of the recent baffling interpretation of Texas Parks & Wildlife's rules regarding Mozambique Tilapia (namely: "Oh sure, it is perfectly legal to own them - "possession" is no problem at all" vs. "Oh, but you can't transport them, even though they'd be in your possession the whole time"), I had to end up teleporting my baby tilapia between project sites. I'd like to thank Google Maps for the accurate coordinate information, the County for precise elevation information, TXU for ignoring the bizarre and extreme power consumption spike, and I would also normally include Fry's Electronics except that although the fish survived the D-Jump intact, Fry's house-brand flux-capacitor burned up almost immediately, and the collapsing worm-hole sucked the remaining jump equipment straight into n-space, lost forever.

Guess I won't be doing THAT again!

Sorry to hear about that flux capacitor mate... Its frustrating when things go wrong like that!

Glad the fish survived though...

Tragedy struck this morning from above. A hawk swooped down, grabbed my oldest daughter's pet duck, wrestled it up over a 10-foot fence, fought with it in my front yard, before killing it three yards away on the corner of our block, leaving a pile of white bloody feathers in their grass.

The remaining duck is moping and assumed lonely/scared.

My wife was kind enough to clean up the mess in the neighbor's yard before it was noticed, while I was on the way to work.

I rigged bird netting over the duck pen this afternoon, which would have been hilarious had anyone been around to watch because I've got some sort of galloping viral eye infection going on, and went to the eye doc this afternoon, so of course I'm out there spreading netting from the top of a ladder, with my eyes dilated and those cheap cheesy temporary sunglasses hugging my face (poorly) while fogging up (almost instantly).

End of day: remaining duck is safe if sad, daughter is coping, and temp-shades are in the trash.

Proceed with caution...

Yeah it is just amazing the size of fish that can swim through a running pump and plug up the piping and stop up the flow to the grow beds. My pump will allow 1/2" solids through it and I have had fish about 1" get through it. they have plugged my bed piping before. Others with craw fish find them in piping that they should not be able to get to. That is one of the reasons I always recommend to people to use the CHIEF PIST system. One pump in the system in a sump tank with no fish in it. So the pump wont eat the fish and plug up the lines.

Texas does have some problems with their rules on Talapia fish. They forget that they are safe in Texas waters because when they escape the moment the water gets below 50 degF they die..... Period.

By the way I like big systems too. Mine is 1100 gallon FT and 48 half barrels for grow beds. No sump.

I may have to redesign at least one of my systems... gotta try SOMETHING...

Tragedy struck again today - no, not the other duck - but my brother just called me from the Dallas site to say that all my fish were dead and stinking. He's not sure if the pump is still on.

Those were my last adults, unless I count the ones at the school, which I don't.

I've got a lot of juvenile fish, so I can repopulate as soon as I get down there and figure out what the problem was, but I'm tired of these setbacks leaving me with no adult fish. Some of them were over a year old.

Oh well, I shouldn't whine - gotta figure out when I can head down there today to clean out all the dead fish and test the water...

Sadly, I am out of the duck business. Despite me covering the duck pen with bird netting, Monday's hawk came back with the dawn patrol for breakfast this morning, managed to get in underneath the netting, drag our other duck out, take it over the fence, and kill it in our front yard.

The family is sad, as am I. We really liked those ducks, and having two pets killed in three days packs an emotional punch on the kids.

Goodbye Turkey, goodbye Pig, you were both silly stupid noisy feather-shedding poop-machines, but you'll be missed.

Im out of ducks too. A wild cat I think. It got 10 Guineas and at least 3 ducks. Agrivation for sure...............
Keep on documenting.

Man, you have my sympathies, Don!

Score!

A nursery in Dallas put out a Craigslist post I was fortunate enough to see this morning (Thank God!), offering rolls of greenhouse film and a variety of plant-starter pots/flats, so I was able to pick up 8 and a half 24ft x 115ft rolls of 1-year greenhouse film (Brand: AT Plastics "Super Dura-Film 1SE", 4mil), and an entire pallet-load of seed-starter flats, for free!

Before I could pull away, a guy pulled up in a frantic hurry and started looking around to see what was left. There was still one last untouched pallet of empty flats, but what he really wanted was greenhouse film (can you blame him?).

He was very pleasant, and I could see what was coming, so when he got up the nerve to ask me "Is there any way I could talk you out of one of those rolls?", I said "sure", and actually gave him one that was still new in the box, plus the loose half-roll, because really - there's no way I need 8.5 rolls of this stuff.

The real pain was that since I'd had them forklift-load the pallet on top of the rolls of film, they were titanically difficult to get out without unloading the trailer, and I had been soaked with sweat and out of breath even before he had arrived.

In the end we parted on great terms, this stranger and I, and I was even able to give him the elevator speech on Aquaponics, which he was somewhat already familiar with because he said a "buddy of his in East Dallas does that". (So if you're on here, and know Leslie, please tell him I said "Hi!")

Here's what 6 of the 7 remaining rolls look like as they are ganged up to kill me (because the effort of moving them by my lonesome just might). The 7th - which if you think about it is actually the 1st - is on a cart halfway across the backyard to wherever I am going to store them, once I figure out where that will be.

Super +1 Score

To all AP'ers in TX (and I guess this could apply to OK, AR, and LA as well) I got a call from the property manager of the industrial lot where I am storing equipment, namely my remaining 12,000 gallon tank, and in a big change of plans TXDOT is now taking (condemning) the entire property for the I-35E expansion (as opposed to just the western half of the property), so I need to get everything off of it by December 1.

If you have a need for a 12Kgallon tank, or know someone who does, whether for purchase, trade, lease, or a really good charity I might be convinced to just donate the thing to, PLEASE let me know ASAP.

Likewise, if you've got a plot of land in the DFW/North Texas/East Texas area you wouldn't mind me storing the tank on, I'd be more than happy to give you several IBC totes in return for the privilege!

As a reminder, here's the size tank I'm talking about:



Thank you very much!