Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi all

Ive been in the aquaculture business now for over 10 years. Completed Bachelor of Science then went to do a Bachelor of Aquaculture with Honours (focusing on fish disease/ecotoxicology work).
During my years at uni, worked on deep sea longliners (Tasmania), prawn boats (SA) and shark boats (VIC/NSW). They were the ideal job for a uni student interested in fishing!!! After uni finsished, worked for Tassal (salmon), Navajo (kingfish) and Stehr Group (SBT tuna, snapper kingfish, mulloway) as fish health/environmental manager. During this time, achieved marine qualifications and currently studying for Master 5 vessel operators certificate.
In both industry and in research, I have worked with over 20 diff. species of marine and freshwater fish and found the most challenging aspect of the job was testing if species had commercial value (red mullet, king george whiting were a few surpise species).
Decided i needed a career change and moved back into ecotoxicology in QLD but 6 months later found myself again in aquaculture, this time in a aquaculture government role for Fisheries Victoria.
The next career step, who knows?
My fiance and I met at Stehr Group and have both worked our whole lives in the aquaculture/fishing industry (Simone is a live feeds technician/broodstock manager who now works in marine/tropical fish).
Both of us love aquaculture and i dont think either of us could be kept away from fish for too long!
I have been amazed with the potential of aquaponics and really enjoy the information this site has to offer. Thanks to all involved.

Cool, an interesting work history, sounds like your fiance was a good catch

She was a lot easier to catch than a 45kg Kingfish!!!!

so will there be fish for dinner at the wedding?

or are you into "catch and release" Kell

finally the bug is infiltrating the government. hopefully this is a sign of change. its time the people in power started to wake up to the environmental crisis that we are faced with today.

please do what ever you can to educate people about the potential you can see for aquaponics. its obvious you are a well educated and credible man that people of most lines will listen to. your not some random guy out in his back shed rambling about ap being the answer to the worlds problems. no offense to any one as i find myself in this category.

my point is you have a lot of potential to change the world for the good by spreading the word of ap. i would love to see you play an active role in the future.

finally i have to congratulate you for sharing the vision and remaining awake. perhaps there is hope yet.

When I was 16, I started a paintball store, and rode the dot com bubble for a while. In store sales exceeded online sales and all was good for 7 years, then the local economy slowed down and less people played. Worked construction for a custom home builder for a year, and have a computer and networking consultation company. Got a degree in computer information technology.

Hi all,

Here is my history.....

Started working as a bottle-shop attendant. Moved indoors to become a bar attendant then decided to travel Australia. Travelled up the east coast as far as Cairns where I landed a job as a white-water rafting guide.

Did that and sea-kayaking tours for a couple of years. Managed a backpackers hostel before moving back to Melbourne.

Back in Melbourne did another 6 years behind the bar before I got sick of it. Became a Porter and did that for 6 months.

After a brief trip to the USA (did Camp America) I moved into Customer service/call center for 2 years. Was seconded to a software testing job from the call center and decided that software testing was a pretty good gig so I did that for another 5 years before the stress got the better of me.

Looked at what I wanted to do and realised that I was happiest when teaching. Became a qualified trainer and started teaching Business and IT for a Registered training organisation in Melbourne.

That company went bust (I don't think it was my fault) so I went back to Software testing. The company I worked for had a training team and I wrangled my way into that team and conducted training for them for another 2 years.

My wife (Dayle) and I decided that we wanted to get some land and slow down (tree change it is called) so we moved up to Lismore in August last year (2006).

I am now working as an energy assessor, installing energy efficient lightbulbs and low-flow shower heads into peoples houses during the day and conducting training courses in Business in the evening.

I am still waiting to slow down.....

That is my story so far. Thanks for listening/reading...

Simon

Hi all,

Thought this is a reasonable place to introduce myself as a newbie.

I'm a control systems/industrial automation Engineer by day and hobby farmer/permaculturalist/experimental rocketeer in the remaining time :-)
Have been doing this since I graduated from uni (about 13 years ago) and still enjoy it immensely. It involves designing/building and commissioning special purpose control systems for special purpose machines of all types.

In almost a complete opposite direction, I enjoy all things to do with the outdoors, including growing food and hobby farming. To this end my wife & I bought a 12 acre place in Blaxlands Ridge about 18 months ago and we are much happier for it (used to live in suburbia, Western Sydney). I commute to work in North Ryde (1hr each way) and every night I get home it seems worth it.
We have some horses and dogs, chooks and cockatiels, but no fish ....yet.
I have constructed numerous vege gardens and have produced plenty of veges thus far. Much happier with the quality and organic nature of these veges too.

I have been implementing permaculture methods since the start and was introduced to the ideas of Aquaponics from some people on the permaculture.org forum.

We have a moderate sized dam (about 1.5 ML) and it currently has HEAPS of young and less larger sized yabbies. I intend to stock it with Golden Perch and maybe implement some form of hydroponic vege farm/aquaponic system off of it. That's why I've joined the forum anyway, to find out my options.

Strud

golden perch should "take care" of your yabbies