Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

8 trout ( 5 healthy and three not so) were placed in a 120 wheelie bin with 2.4kgs salt and an air stone. Checked water in the bin tonight, ammonia 1.0ppm @ ph 6.5, happy with that.

Two of the sick fish had died by tonight, one more might, but the opthers are doing really well.

Dads system may well be saved by steve and anges courtyard system!

It will be re-located to my place over the next few days as they are moving, and i'm thinking of incorporating the 20L established bioflter gravel straight onto dads system!

BAP's first "organ" donation

I'll put their SP into my main tank and re-establish a biofilter over the next 2-3 months

Relocated steve and anges 20L biofilter into dads blue barrel biofilter. HEAPS of worms in there, i had only put a few compost worms in but there was an assortment of earthworms too, and a heap of little ones that seemed to have just hatched.

no more deaths from the isolated trout.

Ammonia was 4+ppm in the pond on 15/6/07

Will check it again in the morning to see if the added cycled gravel has had an impact yet.

Let me start this post by saying i love problem solving, but hate working the either the rain, dark or cold.....................

The 10 odd trout that were put into the wheelie bin are dead.
They were coming along nicely until the air pump shit itself. oh well.

Dad had decided to expand his AP setup to three parallel 6m lengths of pvc , so modicfications to drains and feeds had to be made.

Will make more sense with pics, but i don't have any at the moment so will try to explain.

A "manifold" was made from 50mm "T"'s and elbows to feed water into each of the 3 NFT pipes and another manifold for a common 50mm drain at the other end.

PROBLEMS!
It was cold today.
Does anyone know how hard it is to get 3 6M lengths of PVC level both individually, and then to each other? they bow. near impossible.

The common drain was run level but horizontal to the end caps and what was happening is that the water would back flow to the lowest pipe, and then to the lowest point on that lowest pipe!

Then it started raining hard!

and he has a system with fish and plants that can't be left not working.

after a coffee the obvious hit me, mount the drain manifold about a foot UNDER the pipes with elbows facing down.

perfect. Now the pipes only have to be level to themselves, not to each other.

Then it got dark.

Still needed to glue all 13 fittings, but as it was now cold, raining and dark we're gonna hope that the push fit method holds

ammonia is still SKY high, but nitrites have just started registering, so it would seem that steve and anges gravel is starting to come through with the goods

Pump has now been ramped up so bio-filter is getting huge flow.

Will test again tomorrow with fingers crossed.

I'm ashamed that i got so excited for him that i didn't follow my own advice

Sounds like alot of fun
i guess thats whats so appealing about the premade systems, no hassles


good to hear your getting nitrites though

nah, the trials are part of the fun i just wish i were a TINY bit more organised, but i've been like this my whole life

Nitrite are only trace, less than 1ppm, but hopeful for test to torrow

Yeah, i plan on sorting my problems out before the addition of fish (excluding the baby goldies, because there producing virtually no waste)

You killing more fish again Steve??
Gee your getting through the varieties too.

bit harsh there TM-
hey TM did you say your selling fingerlings?

Yes, killing again, as with most aquarium deaths they're killed by kindness and excitement. I should have known better, yes. Was very eager to have a system up for dad due to his excitement in AP. Nothings a loss if you learn learn learn. Maybe it will also show others that you CANT CHEAT the nitrogen cycle

More like bad luck wasnt it Steve, with the air pump buggering up. They have a habit of doing that just when you need them most.

C1, still have some fingerlings for sale if you are interested. I have mainly Rainbow plus a few Brown if you want to try them.

TM i dare say steve and ange will hook up with some when they move over in about a month

Where abouts are they going to be living??

busso, its where he grew up.

busso wheres that

sorry, busselton, WA.

I think it might actually be close to trout man? I'll let one of the WAians answer