Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

jealous of a WA winter lol

Show off .... lol

do WA folk KNOW what winter is??????????????????

To answer your question F&F - the biofilter action of the beds is essentially the conversion of ammonia to nitrite (nitrosomonos bacteria responsible) and nitrite to nitrat (nitrobacter responsible). This bacterial action will continue regardless of whether there are plants, but could slow a bit if really cold.

The problem you will face by not having plants is that there will be nothing to remove the nitrate. You have a couple of options here as I see it:

1. grow some winter stuff you will eat
2. grow some witner stuff you can sell or give to friends/relatives
3. grow other stuff as suggested like flowers, or if desperate, do what I did when I needed to get some nitrates out of my system - sow a heap of oats, wheat or some sort of grain that will grow in winter in your area. It will be of no real use to you other than to control the nitrate.

To expand of VB'answer...................

If you have fallow growbeds then your AP system becomes a big aquarium.

AS VB stated, the bacteria will continue to process the ammonia to nitrate (as would an aquarium filter), but becasue the plants are not taking up nitrate (due to lack of plants ) then they will rise to a point where you will have to do regular water changes, like anyone with an aquarium would.

Make sense?

Its here one day and gone the next...

similar to Cairns... compaired to the rest of QLD we get to the start of Autumn then head back towards summer

and whats wrong with a little bit of gas ??

my dad has this saying " its a sick arse that dosnt fart"

asuming that you have fish that will still feed at cooler temps to provide food for the bacteria and thus the plants then surely growing things in winter shouldnt be a problem

see how you go, f&f.

The perch will definatly slow down in feeding at about 15C and probably won't feed much under that. so you may only need to plant a few token things anyway.

Just make sure you keep an eye on them taking food so you're not dumping "summer" quantities in with out them actually eating it.