Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

The first brood of babies are about 1" long now, and we have a second brood of little ones. The larger babies are helping us "thin out" the younger ones, and it looks like the adults may have done some thinning too even though I've read that they are non-carniverous. It appears that about a dozen mid-size babies have survived, which is more than our tank will accommodate anyway (the excess survivors will go off to the pet shop, unless we decide to try a whitebait omelet).

[left]http://BrainRight.com/Aquaponics/2007090302_BabyTilapiaAbout1InchLong.jpg[/left][right]http://BrainRight.com/Aquaponics/2007090301_BabiesAndAdultTilapia.jpg[/right]

I was asked where I got the flow valves at the top - here's a link to them at US Plastic Corporation. These are very inexpensive and they work fine for flow control like this, but they are NOT for applications involving any significant pressure (they will leak).

You can see below that there's a 1/2" hole drilled at the top of each tube, and this serves two purposes. Firstly, if water backs up in the grow tube the hole allows water to run down the side of the tube instead of overflowing at the top, so the top support won't get wet. And secondly, it allows me to see the water flow from below so I can adjust the valves without standing on a stool.

[left]http://BrainRight.com/Aquaponics/2007090303_ValvesAtTop.jpg[/left]

To start the seedlings, have you considered using Rockwool used in hydroponics? I wouldn’t use the big cubes (1 ½” ) in their untouched form. You could use a razor blade to slice the rockwool into much smaller cubes (5mm maybe?) It absorbs a lot of water but doesn’t seem to cause seed rot.

Really cool system.

I hear your challenges with the seed starting. I faced some similar issues in hydroponics. It seems so many seeds started in paper towels, damp off.

I've had problems with spinach too. Those seeds can be picky, they don't like to be too wet but they also seem to like dark. Scarification of the seeds by nicking or acid may help but I only seed to be getting any spinach by using dirt.

I did find that the yarn from a rayon mop head works as a wonderful wick in a hydroponics set up and for lettuce it has worked very well to place the seed on a little bit of that yarn and let the other end dangle into the nutrient. Perhaps just a small bit of that stuff would work better than the paper towel. I've found that getting seeds started directly in my "net pots" really saves a lot of time on transplanting. This is experience in hydro that I definitely think could prove useful for AP. For pictures of my use of wicks here is a link to my hydro story.
TCLynx Hydroponics


I've also used bits of cotton balls for this purpose but they can get too wet and can get almost as yucky as the paper towel.

Anyway, I love the system and I hope you have had a chance for your fish dinner. I really would love to get into this but I still have a lot of reading to do.

LOL, i notice that google has inserted an ad for the other aquaponics site and forum on your page. yet you are a member here love the irony

Statistically no one clicks on the sponsored links anyway. It has always looked kinda dodgy to me... They are usually all spam sites anyway.

Very impressed with your system jay. I've got a few questions for you.
Are you only using sunlight as a light source? Have you used any supplemental lighting? How often do you harvest? How quickly are you harvesting greens? Have you added any fruiting plants (do you plan too)?

You said some got long and spindly because of heat, do you think it may be because of a lack of light? I'm not familair with too many plants but I know that a plant in shade will do anything it can to find light.

I'm looking to build a indoor system and your set-up was linked in a thread I had begun to ask questions so I'm very much intrigued by this set-up. What would you change about the current set-up? Or are you completely satisfied with it?

Any tips for a aquaponics-noob who has no fish raising skills?

From what I read you have a great setup; congrats, however, I cannot see any of the pics. I have tried clicking "Show pictues" but no results. Do you have another website I can see?

The system has been shut down and dismantled, as we are selling our home and will be moving soon. We ate the largest of the fish, which weighed in at about 10 ounces before cleaning and a lot less afterward. It was only a snack but it was quite tasty.

I don't know why the pictures don't show up in the forum posts anymore but here's a link to our web page with pictures: http://BrainRight.com/Aquaponics

Here are some lessons we learned from this project:

1. Fish eat a lot. In retrospect we wish we had first created a sustainable food source such as raising worms, mealworms, duckweed etc. For this small number of fish it was okay to buy commercial food but if we did this on a larger scale we'd try to grow much of our own fish food.

2. Fish poop a lot. Cleaning the rectangular aquarium got to be a chore, especially with 'Hotel Tilafornia' in the way. If I were to do it again I'd use a cone-bottomed polyethylene tank with a bottom drain so I could clean the tank just by opening a valve. On the plus side, our tomatoes and peppers LOVED the fertilized water.

3. Having fresh salads all winter was great. The best greens were basil and cress. Lettuce was okay but somewhat flavorless and prone to white flies. The spinach was a total flop. We tried some epazote late in the project and it seemed to be doing okay but we shut the system down before it had a chance to grow much.

4. The pea gravel in the grow tubes was adequate but not great. I think it increased the water hardness, even with frequent water changes, and it was hard to start seeds in it as I noted previously. Something like pearlite might work better for the seeds but could be more problematic in other ways and it would cost more.

5. Tilapia are hardy fish. More than once we waited too long between water changes and the fish suffered somewhat, but they recovered. I think most other fish wouldn't have fared as well under less-than-ideal water conditions. The tilapia did well when we changed about 20% of the water once a week.

6. Water changes became easier after we installed an under-the-counter water filter to remove chlorine etc. from our municipal tap water. We just filled a large pail from the filter and let it warm to room temperature and then added it directly to the tank, with no apparent adverse effects on the fish.

Thanks to all who commented on this system and I wish you success with your own projects.

Best Regards,
Jay

"If you were to do it again?"

No plans?

Hope to see you back with another "you-beaut" system soon Jay....