Thinking about an aquaponics system

[Ryan]

Anyone have one or know somebody that does? I've heard q little about them, but always thought it was for large scale operations. Until this morning while watching Market to Market(PBS farm program). They said its really catching on even on a small scale. Did some research, sure enough people have them in their house very small though. For those that don't know what it is it consist of a fish tank filled with tilapia(or other fish). You feed the fish, they crap, that water is the pumped to the vegetable box. The veggies grow in the water and use up all the nutrients. The cleaned water is then dumped back in the fish tank. The veggies are supposed to grow much faster this way. If anyone has one I've got some questions. After harvest I'm planning on building a small one. It'd be awesome to have fresh fish and vegetables year round. TIA!

[SMOKE FREAK]

Ill grow my veggies in the soil thank you...Good soil rich in organic matter will trump the hydros any day...( my opinion )

[Richtee]

Hmm... seems like it's a little more complicated than that. Where's all the trace elements soil has. Then you need to consider lighting... I can't see this being too ecnomical for veggies. Other cash crops perhaps...

[curious aardvark]

interesting - hydroponics has been around for a long time and I saw a program with some medium scale industrial units used for growing cattle feed.

But a fish tank cycled through a veggie tank ?
New one on me.

That said our garden pond grow oxygenating weed like you wouldn't believe, and also lots and lots of other wildlife. We could probably go into production with freshwater shrimp :-)

I think you'd need a big fish pond - and don't forget you have to feed the fish and fish food is nowhere near as cheap as compost.

[Ryan]

http://www.iptv.org/mtom/story.cfm/f..._feature/video

There's the link to the episode I saw, or you can scroll down to read it. As far as expensive, I can't answer that. However, remember your basically double cropping. One site I found sold a small unit, not sure of the size. But annually it would produce 900-1400 heads of lettuce and raise 110 pounds of tilapia. Electricity wise it requires 2.4 amp 120volt. And yes CA I just read on Wikipedia fresh water prawns can be used. Forgot to mention that system I found was their smallest in home system but was dam pricey $3300. That's why if I do this I'll build my own just a a lot smaller to start.

[SQWIB]

I dabbled in it but tried with KOI, no I didn't eat the Koi but since I had a koi pond I messed around with it. I did not have enough fish waste to sustain the tomatoes, once the tomatoes started to grow the plant really declined. I did harvest a few types of cayenne peppers but the Bell peppers just did not have enough nourishment.

Tilapia Fingerlings mature in 8 months IIRC but require water temps around 70°
So since that was not doable I looked into trout and they're two years to mature.
The only way I could do the tilapia is indoors since I'm in zone 6.
It is really just a balancing act and isn't as hard as many folks believe.

[SQWIB]

I was going to try one of these but my climate is not optimal.

[dsgarner06]

For most home use aquaponics are not cost effective. You need a fairly large setup both in the number of fish to produce the right amount of emulsion to sustain plants, as well as the system to distribute the water flow and a good water filter (typically uv light based). Commercially this is definitely a sustainable method to grow plants, veggies and even other cash crops, but it takes a sizable investment and a rather large setup to house the fish, the greenhouse/plants, the lighting, etc.

A friend of mine looked into doing this at home and basically couldn't justify the cost for home use..... YMMV

[Whisky Fish]

This just happens to be one of my many projects that I am putting together. Dispite the skeptisism here, it can be a viable sideline on a small scale. Particularly if you are looking toward a self reliant lifestyle. There are calculations for aquarium size to quantity of fish to grow bed size. These can be found here;
http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum/
along with some other useful info. It's no Smoked-meats, but it's kind of useful if you're looking for answers.

[Ryan]

This just happens to be one of my many projects that I am putting together. Dispite the skeptisism here, it can be a viable sideline on a small scale. Particularly if you are looking toward a self reliant lifestyle. There are calculations for aquarium size to quantity of fish to grow bed size. These can be found here;
http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum/
along with some other useful info. It's no Smoked-meats, but it's kind of useful if you're looking for answers.

Thanks whisky! I've done some reading on that site. The more I read the more I wanna do this. Having trouble finding blue prints for one, but plan on buying a book to help. My goal is to start small and see how I like it. If its something I like and economically viable I would expand slowly and sell on craigslist.

[curious aardvark]

not sure if it's relevant - but cowgirl/jeanie raises large freshwater shrimp in her pond.

Big suckers not the tiny little things I've got in my garden ponds.

Helluva profitable market for them