Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Private or with a Tafe or Uni body?

UWA and private, I believe

Kewl, would be nice if he owuld sign up and share his expertise here

welcome to the forum adrian9737,

sounds like a cool project. keep us all informed.

Yeah my brother has done work experience with Brett. He's the one I got my few trout off... He has a 'smallish' aquaculture setup at his property... totaling maybe 50KL+... Apparently he has some connection to Golden Ponds too...

I see Brett is also offering an Aquaponics course at UWA summer school.
Dont think I would do it though as I have heard (thru fisheries) that his name has been linked to quite a few failed aquaculture set ups.

well if he's been linked to quite a few failed aquaculture set ups perhaps he now knows what not to do.

was Brett involved in the Jurien catastrophe?

I dont know which ones, was just told he had a hand in more than one.

Brett is a very knowledgeable person from what I perceived. He has been all over the world with his aquaculture consultancies so I can imagine there have been a few failures... I don't know.

His stance on aquaponics is a bit different to ours. I think he realized the sheer amount of water that was being wasted in aquaculture so he utilised some of it to grow plants. He him self was growing vegetables using his aquaculture water. It wasn't a separate system as such because he still uses large biofilters to clean his water.

I think he understands the benefits of Aquaponics, but I think he is still skeptical of the true potential of AP as a stand alone system. Thats what come across when I was talking to him.

I can't speak for Brett. My brother says he hardly uses a computer or the internet, but it still would be great to get him online here...

Yeah, sounds like he's got a lot of knowledge that would in one way or another be benficial.

Even failures can be benficial in teaching others what doesn't work and to avoid.

As we have all found out!!
Taking one (or 2) for the team!!

the only bad mistake is one not learned from. all mistake are good so long as you don't make the same mistake again. if we live in fear of making mistakes we will never progress.

ironically from what i gather the same mistakes are made over and over in the aquaculture industry. hopefully this wont be the case with aquaponics, in large part due to this forum. freedom of knowledge and expirience is shared for the greater whole of the industry. sure you might get the odd egocentric who thinks they know it all but really we're on the same playing field. imo there is so much to learn which goes far beyond science.

Your right BF Aquaculture does seem to have a chequered history in WA, particuarly with freshwater finfish. I just got a copy of the latest Aqua Info magazine and it shows that production of both Barra and Trout in this state at least is declining and this is largely due to farms closing down. Silver Perch show a 3% rise in production but even there 3 farms closed down last year!! Its hard to believe but Goldfish/Koi Carp is still the most valuable freshwater finfish industry in this state.

Strange isn't it... Aquaculture, one of the fastest growing industries in Australia, yet going backwards here in W.A.

Seems to only be freshwater finfish going backwards EB and frow what I can gather this has been maily due to several large farms closing up. Mussels, Marron and Yabbies seem to be continually growing. In fact of all the aquaculture licenses issued in WA Marron now comprise 40% of them.