Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

My son and I started this project in July 2014 while he was home after his first year in college. He had been reading the aquaponics threads on reddit and other sites, and decided we should give it a try. We wanted a large enough system that it would be easier to stabilize, but small enough to stay within a very limited budget. After doing some research, my son decided we should build a tank with a SLO, pump in the sump, and bell syphons to drain the grow beds.

We chose lava rock as grow media - took a long time to wash, but its cheap! As it turned out, buying in bulk from a local landscaper was about the same price as bags from the local building center.

My son built the plumbing

We set the system up in the back yard, and started the pump. We used a 17 gal (64 l) tub as a sump, buried under one of the grow beds. We initially used a sock as a filter, but it clogged quickly. We went to a cut- down bucket as a swirl filter, and then switched that to a clear container thinking to pretty it up. The clear tank proved to be an excellent algae farm, so we are back to a bucket

We stocked the tank with feeder goldfish (comets) because we figured to lose a few while we tinkered with the setup. My son jump-started the nitrogen cycle by adding a bit of water and mud from a neighborhood pond. We got everything running late in the summer so never got the plants going well. By the time they started to fruit, we started getting cooler nights.

My son went back to school, but I wanted to try to keep the system going over the winter. I built a small greenhouse (8' x 6' or about 2.5m x 2m) to enclose the system. I didn't get it enclosed quickly enough to save the vegetables, but have some other stuff going now. The greenhouse is covered inside and out with "clear" 6mil polyethylene. The whole thing blew over shortly after I set it up (>35mph - 60kph winds) so now its staked down with rebar.

The tank is heated by a 300 watt aquarium heater. I added a string of lights so I can check the system at night, and a thermometer for the tank and inside so I can track the air temp and water temp. Water temps have not dropped below 55 (13C) but air temps have been down to 39 (4C). Overnight temps outside have been down to 25 (-4C), so not too bad. This next week is supposed to be some extended cold, so we shall see how it holds up.

Welcome and congratulations on a neat looking build Matt and son.

The GB's look a bit shallow which limits the bio-filtration area, have you thought about more and bigger GB's

the sump doesn't very big do you have any problems maintaining the water level?
if it was me I would consider getting rid of the sump and filter and put the pump in the FT.

Slowboat- I think you are correct on your assessment of the grow beds and sump. I'm thinking of adding a third bed over the fish tank - would be a 50% increase over what I have, and keep the same footprint. The sump works for the current volume, ( can cycle both beds at once without overflow or exposing the pump) but would probably be too small for adding a third bed. I have not had to top off the system too often, since I found the leak in the old filter. The fish seem happy, and I don't feed them very often so the beds as is are keeping up.
Thanks for the advice!

Upgraded the system pump from a 330gph (1250lph) pump to a 620gph (2350lph) pump, $40 US from Harbor Freight - Pacific Hydrostar, with two year replacement warranty. The increased flow has smoothed out the function of the bell syphons - they start faster and more reliably so far.

Added a second 300W tank heater. With the two heaters, the temps have stabilized somewhat inside the greenhouse, even though this has been one of the coldest Novembers recorded for this region. The night before I added the second heater, I lost the few spindly tomato plants I had started due to cold. It's pretty late in the year to start anything new from seed, so I have some lettuce 'stumps' sprouting and some scallions to try and keep the Nitrate levels under control. I may add some house-plants too if I lose any fish.

I started treating my water when topping off the sump levels. I was just letting the water sit in buckets for a day or two before adding it to the tank, but I was adding quite a bit of water (I had a leak in the system I hadn't discovered) and I was killing about a goldfish a week. Now I add the Top-Fin aquarium water conditioner (just the stuff for treating chlorine and chloramine, without the ick treatment antibiotics) too, and still let the water sit for a day before I add it to the sump - have not lost a fish since.