Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Yep looks foolproof...as long as the water level isn't let to drop too much (via evaporation..transpiration...etc)

Apart from that great growth!!

Unreal!

How much sun does the system get?

sooo joel where did ya get that tank and how much ya pay for it ??

CHeers
pete

Very nice. I have been attracted to that type of setup. Very simple and clean.

The fish tank is around 1300dia x 900mm, 1000L and I think it was $350 from tankmasters.. The system only geys about 2 hours of direct sunlight, but it has a fair bit of indirect light off the fences and side of the house.

I was experimenting with a large board covered with alfoil fixed to the side of the house, it will help growth a fair bit I think. I'll try and get come photo comparisons over the next couple of days to compare the extra light.

Yeah I would be interested in the light issue.

My system gets about 2 hours a day but first thing in the morning. The rest of the day is indirect.

Plants look really bad except ornamental shade loving plants.

EB that fish drain is just like the one I am using too, and it does pull the solids out! Putting fittings at the bottom of tanks gives me the heebie jeebies.

Would you have to keep your fish load down some in this kind of system?

Yeah fish levels will be down a bit... I will test them out a little later, I still have to finish it off by putting some plants in the drain tank, and covering half of the fish tank with a floating raft.. Then I'll put some more fish in and see how well the system copes..

Here we are at 3 weeks growth, not bad for a brand new system that gets very little sunlight... I guess thats the advantage you get when you can top a new system up with water from a mature system..

50% water from a mature system = almost instantly mature new system..

There's still only half a down plate size silver perch in the fish tank ATM..

I'm thinking I'll do something like this for my system. The top of the fish tank will be higher than the growbeds so I can use a "venturi" drain from the fish tank to the growbeds. The GB's will drain into a sump (which may end up having a rafts.... Then I'll only need one pump to move water from the sump to the fish tank.

1 pump is always good if you can get away with it ems... I'm sticking a raft in my fish tank soon, the drain tank I was thinking about some pots of water plants, kangkong etc..

this is very nice an neat...

for a simple flood and drain, what timing systems can be used...

Thats what we are thinking atm... but i need a timing system so flooding happens regularly at a set time

The timer I'm using on the system is one of the very simple ones you can buy from almost any hardware of general homewares store, it's mechanical with small 15 minute increments that you either push down for on time, or leave up for off time..

My first lettuce is pretty much ready to pick, exactly one month after building the system and planting seedling..

A friend has given me some boronia cuttings that I'm having a bit of a play with in the system to see what sort of a strike rate we can get. One of the boronia, a white one, is evidently very hard to propogate, and very valuable as a cut flower..

I've also included the original picture here for a comparison of 1 months growth from the fresh planted seedlings.