Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

LOl another question, some of the yabbies have this funny tiny white/transparent leech like things on their back. They attach one end to the yabby and have these little strands/arms waving in the air. You can brush them off and they'll do this little grub like jerky movement across the yabby to hide underneath. Are t6hese things bad? I'd have no idea how to treat a yabby LOL

pic of the baby yabby-

teeeeny

Some more pics.

Cmere so I can pinch ya

This guys very blue

The yabby barracks where their all currently living

the system all set up and running

Go the tupperware......rubbermaid now has competition

Well the actual system has now been running for a short time, am satisfied that the mechanical aspects are working fine but the biological aren't. I'm truly surprised LOL 6 yabbies don't seem to be able to keep a lettuce alive. The whole thing is beginning to look rather unhappy and the outside leaves have begun to wilt, though the centre leaves still look okay.

So after going to the Tocal Field day, have had all sorts of ideas buzzing round my head LOl. What I think I'll try first, using all the Tupperware, is move the yabbies into separate containers, all hooked up the system, so water goes through the red growbed, through the condos, through the last two growbeds and back to the tank.

Then stick fish into the tub, since it seems they might produce a bit more ammonia.

dunno how many new south walians went to the Tocal Field Day, but of those who did what did you think of aquasonics aquaponics display?

Don't suppose you got any pics by chance??

Fill us all in Cuti.. what did the display comprise???

Aquasonic had an aquaponic display? Yes, tell us more.... what was it?

Wasn't the $4000 "Backyard Fish Farm" I linked to before was it???

http://www.aquasonic.com.au/brochures/B ... h-Farm.pdf

Nope, it was called a backyard fish farm though.

Three sizes ranging from 1000-2000l, prices from $2000-3000. The display was the 1500l one. Looked really nice and spiffy, had a viewing window in the front so you could see the fish. An NFT pipe set up round the sides filled with lettuces, Airlift was used to make a very reasonable stream of water. The filters a bit harder to explain, there was a pipe in the centre like an overflow which took water out and into a bucket, the water then was airlifted up a pipe in the centre of a bucket where it then fell back over filter foam and biomedia before being returned to the tank. Everything was run by airlift, it really did look very nice. Pretty cheap too when you think about it, it could be bought direct from aquasonic unlike most of their products in which you have to go through a pet store.

cuti, can you explain the filtration system in more depth? how often did the filter need to be cleaned, size?, how many fish could the 1500l tank support?, number of NFT sites?

We were told the 1500l tank could take up to 30kg of fish. He didn't say much bout the filter, except that it'd be cheaper to buy it off of them then build it yourself as many of the components were expensive. Ummm from memory there were just over 20 lettuces in the pipe, but it could be modified to take 30-40 and more pipe could also be added to take more.

30 kg in 1500ltr

They reckoned 20-40kg in 2,500ltr for the one I linked to.... granted this new one has some lettuces in nft..... but 20 lettuces to suck up 30KG of fish in 1500ltr???

LOl his exact words were "30kg would be the max you'd go"

I'm sure.... that's 60 x 500gm (plate sized) fish.....

unless they were sardines..... LOL

Must be a darn good filter..... or were they advising 50% water changes every two days??