Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Would probably be a layer at the bottom - but the design of this particular biofilter is such that I have to pour out the hydroton before I will even see the bottom, by which time a lot of the gunk will have dislodged.

PS - it's really not suprising that there would be a lot of gunk actually. I will weight the amount of food that I have been feeding them and advise - but I would suspect that at the peak - before HSM - I was feeding 60 grams per feed (twice daily). The shit has gotta go somewhere. Everyone with an ap bed will know that if you dig a hole in the bed on the flood cycle, the water in that hole will be extremely dirty. Good thing is that by the time the water gets back to the tank or sump, most of the suspension has been filtered out by the gravel (hence the dirty gravel).

I do have worms in the biofilter - but I don't think the consitions in there are as favourable as my grow-bed and I don't think I have too many in there.

It's in the Slang acronyms

Ran a test at 10.30pm tonight. Ammonia 0, Nitrite .25 - so all is good. Gave the fish a decent feed - bloody famished.

Was one more dead fish - 9cm in length. I assume this one died due to the stress related to increased ammonia levels. All the others are looking very healthy. Were schooling high in the tank waiting for a feed :-)

Two points vb: (plus one)
1) I too could have been a part of the barra HSM , but for a counting miscalculation :snigger:
2) Did you also take a dose of salt to calm your stress :doublesnigger:
3) did it work :snigger: :snigger: :snigger:

Les - a counting and measurement error

BTW - the Barra are looking really good and hungry as shit. I expect their growth to explode once I get them into the 1000 litre tank :snigger:

I'll also count them at that point and I'll let you know if I have 200 :snigger: :snigger:

bugger

got a new fish tank and plumbing it in (well, working on plumbing it)...will get around to adding the info to my thread

What's going in there? The littlies?

Yep - should take me another week to set it up properly, then move them out of the sump...got some monster sized littlies now (probably not as big as the barra) certainly eating well and putting on the weight/size

Need to cull a few of the larger SP as they are getting to plate size again too

Made a concerted effort this weekend to get the barra out of the nursery and into a single bed system with 1000 litre fish tank in shed.

This meant:

1. Finishing painting grow-bed stand
2. Dragging out a grow-bed from the back of the shed and giving it a good clean
3. Getting 1000 litre tank ready. I'd fashioned up some fittings to go on the 80mm pressure T last weekend, so this weeked just had to fix up the leaky ball valve
4. Since the nursery tank setup is in the way of where the 1000 litre tank needs to go - setting up another temp fingerling tank to move the fish into while I move the nursery out of the way and get the 1000 litre job into position.
5. Catch and move all fish into the temporary tank. This was easier said than done - those buggers are pretty fast. I counted them as they were transferred.
6. Getting the 1000 litre into position and filling it with some neutralised tap water as well as water fromt he nursery - I've only 3/4 filled it at this stage.
7. Moving the biofilters onto the 1000 litre.
8. Moving the fish.

Didn't have time this weekend to setup the grow-bed, which will sit on the other side of the shed wall. Will have to do this next weekend if I have time. In the meantime the biofilters will have to keep running the show.

Everything went okay - albeit painfully slowly. This was the first time I've put the grow-bed into the stand. I made this stand using the same measurements as the last - but added another couple of centimetres because the bed was a bit tight in the first one. What I didn't take into acount is just how much smaller the outside measurements of the grow-bed are due to the last 3 I bought being so much thinner than the first one (much less resin). There is a bit of room - but it is still supported fine, particularly since I made this one with 3 cross bits instead of the 2 I put in the firt one.

Anyway, here are a couple of pics.

I took a couple of pictures of the barra - you'll struggle to make them out though.

good to see you're using the big wheelbarrow VB and the good tools too

- invaluable.

When I see photos of other peoples sheds I'm just so glad that they look like mine ......

Spent the weekend cleaning up my shed as part of preparations for moving the tank in.....

Nice to see the barra system coming along VB.

Rupe, that IS the tidy bit