Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I got a few thing accomplished. Each a struggle. All of these issues are coming up as prerequisites to building the grow beds, frustrating and moving slowing but surly.

The screened in box is the best I could think of with the materials on hand to give the automatic exhaust fan an air inlet. Some things, okay everything I can think to put off I am putting off.
The blue receptacle on top is the new box for the outdoor lights.
Next I have to deal with the point where the wall meets the ceiling. I knew I was putting that off, but all of a sudden now that I'm going to insulate and put up wall boards I've got to finish framing it out and insulate and box in the top corner as well.

The blue box with no wires is the DC power coming in by the sump pump. What a pita, Going from outdoors to inside I want it water proof and large enough for the larger DC cables. I wound up mounting a water-proof box outside and ran the conduit into the back, without a conduit fitting, because it just wouldn't fit. Honestly I was tired of fooling around with it and decided nobody is ever going to see it. Besides it is an isolated system for the rest of the house and low voltage too boot.
I may install the air pump outside so we don't need to listen to it,
My issues with using the pure sine-wave power off the wind turbine is it is on the other side of the house. I'll plug the DC adapter fro the Jabeo pump into the GFI outlet i have there now, perhaps with a small UPS. I have most everything I need to throw together another small PV system for this project.

+1

If the place were the air pump resides is not insulated enough during t5he winter you could see a cooling effect on the water you are distributing it to. Other than that great idea.

Brian, your pond looks amazing. You do really classy work.

makes sense, bummer, plan B? Perhaps down behind the biofilters? Maybe I won't worry about it just now.thanks

I thin as long as the intake is inside, you would be Ok. not sure what you're running for air. If a regen, it's easy to pipe the intake.

I haven't begun shopping air pumps yet. What do you think? I was hoping for something a bit calmer that what you have. I do like endurance of course

if you know your fish densities/pounds, you can figure out how much air you need. Tell me how many pounds at maturity, and I can tell you how much air you need, then you can decide what type of pump is best for your needs.

Coach,
Putting your money to work already, LOL

Brian,

I was thinking on the same plane as Coach. The air pump could be outside the greenhouse in its own enclosure. Just leave a small porthole for air to pass through in the winter months. During the rest of the year, close said porthole and get your air from outside. Think uni seal with a capped piece of pipe in it. Uncap during the winter.

I am glad I have you guys. I may be decent system trouble shooter, but numbers become indecipherable hieroglyphics in my head. On top of that I know my system descriptions to my friends family and especially my wife are pretty well rose colored. Honestly what goes through my head as much as anything is the scene in Independence Day the movie, where Will Smith asks Jeff Goldblum if he could do any of that bullshit he said he could?
Short answer: Fifty or so trout of various sizes. Perhaps a shielded section of the pond for brood. A couple locally caught catfish to help with bottom cleaning.
I guess one of the reasons I came to be a great hip trouble shooter is because I keep putting myself in a position of need. I'm sorry what was the question? How many fish? How big? Honestly as many trout as possible, until I catch them and eat them. I hadn't figured out how to catch them yet, except with a net. With an irregular shape fish tank and lots of hiding places, I assume I'll never catch them all. Also and this may be naive, well is naive, my son's favorite hobby is fly fishing and trout. He knows his fish. I figured we go to a local high country lake and catch our limit of small trout, the ones we'd normally let go. Adding five or six healthy trout every weekend. Perhaps with a quarantine stay in an aquarium for a week first. Yep, I've got a lot more gray areas than crystal clear ones.

You will defiantly want to quarantine them for the first week in a salted tank. The stress from catching them and the injury they received from the hook makes them susceptible to disease. I would also suggest a barbless hook. Although being a fisherman. I know catching a trout with a barbless hook is quite a task.

That's fine with me, I've been wanting a reason to get a big fish tank in the house.


Wow! Check out the size of this media bed!
"Flintenbreite constructed wetland" by Nelsnelson - Own work. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File: ... etland.jpg
So many neat ideas. I do want a few large outdoor media beds, I hadn't thought about building them right in the ground, I wonder if rice would grow up here at 7400 ft above sea level (2256 MAMSL?)

I haven't built any of these but based on my experiences with gravel walkways, having the beds at that level, you'd probably have lots of dirt and weeds get in them.

I'm certainly no carpenter, but it sure helps having a power miter saw (chop box saw) Every cut perfect, all I have to do is measure them correctly It has taken all morning to get the greenhouse ready. I moved all the as yet unused flagstone outside and cleaned the walls of miscellaneous tools and junk. I never did get my workshop to this stage, just started using it with bare studs.
This is a good thing right?



I'm going to finish the two center beams today too. This will get working over the pond over with before I coat it with Herco Koi Pond treatment. I'm so close on that coating it is making me a little crazy to have to do the ceiling first, oh well.


When I'm done framing these, it will allow me to tie the wall to the ceiling without having to make too many crazy cuts in the OSB (Oriented Strand Board) we're using for walls for now. My wife has been collecting odd cans of paint for years, this I hope, will give her a sense of involvement giving the wood a good thick coat of paint.

I'm curious now how they keep weeds out of rice paddies