Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

No shortage of O2, the trout are doing fine in the same system, and none of the cod are ever anywhere near the surface or in the bubbles from the always-on air pump- they hang out on the bottom.

At least they are growing!

Yes, that was towards the lower end of lengths, but quite a bit of growth has been due to a reduction in numbers, and I think I can identify the guilty fish, which are quite large!

NO3 was 10-20ppm, no worries there, so stuffed if I know why it died, all the chemical tests are fine. I might do a taste test tomorrow.

The water temp was up to 21.7C today, not ideal for the trout, and they did not eat much at all today, but neither did the Murray Cod, which is odd, as they usually eat well when the water is that warm.

Another 2 deaths overnight- still fairly pliable, so not dead very long when I found them about 8am. 500g and 421g. All 3 now gutted and in the fridge, until I move them to bbq for lunch.
The small one had quite a few fatty deposits inside the cavity, but all 3 were a bit hollow in the stomach area as they hadn't been eating much, if anything, lately. Maybe they have had enough ox heart and want something else, so I threw in some wasp maggots this morning, and am soaking some 5mm pellets to soften them, which I'll squeeze to make them sink and see if they will go for them. They have never wanted to eat pellets in the past, so I'm not sure if they will go for them now.

If they all die, it wont be a complete loss as they are all large enough to eat - I'll just have to check regularly so they are fresh.




Not sure what to make of this red mark, perhaps due to abrasion on the bottom of the SLO?

You still did way better on them than me.

How do they taste?

On the BBQ as I type

Will let you know soon.

They were delicious- quite a soft flesh, almost creamy, and as with trout, no need to scale them beforehand, the skin is edible and yummy. They were a bit more fiddly to de-bone as we ate them compared with trout, but no real hassle if careful. I just put a few small splashes of oil on the BBQ and tipped a little lemon juice on them a few times during cooking, the big one took about 12 or 13 mins per side, a bit longer than trout takes.

I would grow them again, but only if I was certain they were pellet trained.

Looking good!


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I just couldn't let that slip by as my last experience with a wasp nest is still painfully fresh in my memory. How did you collect them safely and did the fish enjoy them ?

I've suffered quite a few paper wasp attacks lately, they are nesting everywhere, I've never seen so many. Also, we are assuming it's the freshly hatched young that have been swarming, accumulating in masses of hundreds around lights and various other odd places- I have to deal with many dozens of them every time I go near my ground mounted solar panel arrays, and I noticed a few dozen of them have managed to get inside the greenhouse. There is a really big nest near the door to my power shed, and more than once they have stung me on the leg when they thought I was a bit too close.

Fortunately, its a different kind of wasp maggot I'm feeding the Cod. BTW, I just scooped a pile out of the ST- so they didnt eat many, if any. These ones are much lighter weight black ones that dont attack, and the maggots live in the worm farm, and are especially partial to things like orange peel.

The trout seem to like them, but I'm holding off feeding them much today (only 30g pellets this morniong), as the water temperature is heading up towards 23C, and I'm a bit concerned about them. All OK last time I uncovered their tank for a look around midday though.

I was watching the Murray Cod, and some are slowly swimming around at the sides and some quite close to the surface (extremely rare!)- I was even able to gently lift one out of the water, before it freaked out and took off in a flap.

Re the cod deaths and behavior, first thing I thought was that the trout may have introduced something, but what ? I couldn't think of anything

A few weeks ago I watched a large spider wasp dragging an even larger paralyzed huntsman across the lawn. I felt sorry for the huntsman, knowing its awful fate, but there's no way I was gonna tangle with that wasp.

Do you BBQ them with greaseproof paper on the hot plate?

Yes Matt- it works well! Just a tiny amount of oil under and on the paper.

I found another M Cod upside down and dead on the bottom just after dark, but took a video of one of them a couple of hours earlier

A short MP4 video near the top of http://gunagulla.com, just under the recent trout photo, or direct link here: http://gunagulla.com/organic/images/Vid ... 150417.mp4 (1280X720 - 26MB) showing how easily handled one of the smaller ones is ATM.

I suspect I'm going to be finding more them dead, but I still have no real idea what the problem is. Tested NH3: 0-0.25ppm and NO2: 0ppm again tonight. They look fine, no sign of any fungus or Ich.

The trout were in 22.5C for 2 1/2 hours this arvo, and its only cooled down to 22.4C now, on a rather warm night, all still ok last I looked befoe it got dark.

They seem pretty dozy if they are letting you touch them.

No idea what's wrong with them. Could it be a long term effect with the oxheart? Meaning they are meant to eat more seafood based foods? For something?

I'm stretching here though.

Try these Gungulla:
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/BBQ-COOKING- ... 3a966d075f

Does a similar thing as the baking paper, but work better.