Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi Folks,

5 years ago I started off with making a flipped barrel system. It was a nice novelty but things never grew very well other than radishes.



Fast forward a few years and with a bit more gardening experience I realised that getting an hour or 2 of sun light a day wasn't doing the poor thing any favours!

Gone a bit bigger this time, but still pathetically small compared to many on here. I cut and flipped an IBC instead of a pickle drum.







Same as others have done before me, bladder is sitting on sand, dug in a bit to make the top the height I wanted it. Bottom of the IBC holds the cut and flipped top. Some little hardwood stakes that I had in the shed were just the right size to bang into the IBC cage across the back to help with the tomotos. Media is 12mm blue metal and it's powered by some fat goldfish that I nicked from our turtle pond. I tied some cheap screening to the outside as the wife didn't approve of the industrial look of the IBC.

The wife is enjoying the produce, so hopefully in a year or so I can make something bigger, plans have been made but she is yet to agree... She's scared that I'll spend a heap of money and get bored...

At the moment it has a bunch of mixed up lettuce and spinach seeds in the front, some strawberries to the left, coriander behind the lettuce, basil under the tomatos, and of course everybodies favourite aquaponic plant MINT which is growing in it's own little hanging basket in the fish tank

I had to plant mint, I quite like a Mojito and I have a lime tree....

Hi Sean,

Great example of a KISS setup.

Tidy set up. That bamboo screening changes the whole look

Cheers folks!

Need to make it a bit bigger now

So I've been a bit busy this weekend :-)

Friday night I swung past the big green box and bought some supplies and in between the showers we've had all weekend this popped up!



Its 4 hoops of electrical conduit, each hoop is 8m long and they're the 32mm orange heavy wall stuff, painted green.

One end of the hoop is attached to the fence with modified saddles



Sorry if that's sideways!

The other end is attached to star droppers with hose clamps



If you face them right the conduit nestles into the Y

Bird netting went over easy, zip tied to the fence rails, stapled to the trellis, and tent pegs to the lawn

It covers my little AP system as well as my in ground stone fruits (peach, plum, apricot, nectarine) and some potted citrus (Tahitian line, mandarin lime, blood orange) and some tomatoes in pots.

If price matters it was about $50 for the conduit, $20 for the paint, and $70 for the net

Already had the rope, saddles, pickets, hose clamps, and tek screws.

Of course a trip to bunnings isn't complete without a random plant, today it was a pineapple guava!

Nice hoops. How far apart are the ends and how tall is it? Looks like ~ 4m tall.

From memory there's about 2.4m between the first few, last gap is more like 1.8m

I just lined them up on the fence posts of the existing fence, then added star pickets to match.

Hoops are 8m long but 1 end is mounted near the top of the fence whilst the other end finishes at ground level. Have to do some fancy sums but it's pretty tall, I can just reach it standing on the very top of a ladder (where the sticker says not to stand)

The netting then goes out past the ends of the hoops to the fences so all up it must be around 4m wide, 5m high, and 12m long

Looks awesome! That conduit's useful stuff, isn't it?

Certainly is!

Mine is a bit more light duty than yours, but you certainly provided a bit of inspiration!

Hopefully it will hold up to the wind OK, I'd certainly be using more hoops and some bracing if it was having anything other than bird netting on it

Time for a bit of an update!

Chopped back a bunch of lettuce, rocket, and spinach so that's looking a bit messy, but have a bunch more coming up from seed in the bed. Also trying to start some in my sprouter (see how that goes...)



Got some radishes growing well



Spring onions are popping up



Strawberries seem happy



Have my first tomato of the season. I think the plant is an "Allans Early Red" or something like that.



Then in the dirt/pots everything seems happy as well!

From left to right we have 2x Pineapple Guava, a Pepino, and a Bay tree



hiding behind the agapanthus is some purple climbing beans, cucumber (I think, may have accidentally planted it) and a pumpkin



Never grown blueberrys before but they seem happy



Sometimes when you're at the shops you come across some nice looking tomatoes but only have one spare pot.. this might get a bit crowded! A tigerela and a black russian



First crop from this apricot, surprised how early they're coming on



Ever bought a plant because you don't know what it is? I bought a "Mandarin Lime" that was only about $12 at the big green hardware store. If it's no good in a Mojito it's no great loss



I've been battling fungal problems with this nectarine tree since it went in about 6 years ago. This is the healthiest I've ever had it looking



If the mandarin lime is no good as a lime I have a tahitian in a pot as well



This tree is insane... I keep chopping it back and it keeps growing. Massive crops of plums every year



My wife wanted this blood orange. With all the other stuff I have growing how could I say no?



Ever been to the hardware store for something small and come home with a tree? Thats how this Japanese seedless mandarin came to be here



All 4 citrus trees will eventually end up in the ground, we just have some landscaping to do first. This way I buy them at the cheaper size, and in a year or 2 I'll have instant bigger trees to plant once we're all finished!

I managed to get a very hard to get bore permit so that I can have all the irrigation water I could ever want, which will mean that I can get rid of the massive rainwater tank (20,000 Gallon) I use at the moment to run the drippers from(everything not in AP has drippers), and reclaim that space for the garden.

Sorry for so many photos! I left out photos of the Zucs, Cucumbers, Apple Cucumbers, Peach, and a bunch of other tomatoes and blueberries scattered around in pots...

Great job on the plantings Sean .

In most of the US it's tough to buy a blood orange, they don't carry them in the grocery. I've heard they don't fit somehow with the US produce market (don't know if this is the case but I'm not sure what the problem is). Wish I could grow one here though

Looking good! I love feijoas (pineapple guavas), ours are tiny but looking very healthy.

I've never had a feijoa it was just an impulse buy, followed by a I may need 2 to pollenate buy!

Blood orange isn't something I've eaten, but I have been well and truly tanked on this stuff...

https://www.danmurphys.com.au/product/DM_360353/smirnoff-signature-serves-blood-orange-2l

My wife worked in fruit and veg for 10 years prior to us having children and rates them so I'll trust her judgement

Pepino was another I wonder what it tastes like / it's cheap buy as well!

Eventually I hope to end up running a lot more AP beds, with a bunch of the trees I'm growing in pots in the ground watered with drippers running from the AP water. I came across drippers designed to run on grey water systems which will hopefully be ok running off AP water

I've got about 50 pak choi seeds srpouted on little pieces of paper towel in one of these - which must set a record for "smallest bell siphon"



Plan is to transplant some to the media bed and the rest into some dirt somewhere. I know they'll germinate in the AP bed but I figured I'd have a play...

So...southern suburbs Adelaide.... means Onkaparinga council? and you got permit for a bore/ congratulations buy a xlotto ticket while your on a winning streak.

Yep, Aberfoyle Park!