Interesting aquaponics project - involves run design!

[Xtina]

My husband found this blog last week, and it's got me seriously thinking of ways I can boost my productivity and deal with my chicken poop problem (topic of another thread I recently posted). What do you guys think?

http://gardenpool.org/

I don't have a pool, but I do have a greenhouse that was built on top of the cement porch outside my back door. I just measured my greenhouse, and with a tank that leaves room for my existing shelves and freezer, I could probably have about 115 gallons to start a project.

Then I found this site, which lists the different kinds of fish you could raise. For some reason, the thought of tilapia isn't very appealing to me, but that's probably a mental thing that I can overcome. The site is geared toward an Australian audience so I'm not sure how that affects the list's applicability for my climate:

http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/information/45-fish.html

I think integrating chickens into aquaponics is fascinating. I didn't have much interest in aquaponics until I saw the Garden Pool site. Anyway, I just thought I'd share it on the BYC in case others find it interesting or possible for their implementation. It's a discussion starter for sure!

 

[Xtina]

Oh, maybe I should also add: the system I'm envisioning involves putting my chicken coop over the pool and growing maybe trout, prawns, crawfish, and maybe those interesting little lobster-like guys on the Australian site. Yobbies? I wonder how I could source those! I haven't even thought much about what veggies I'd grow, and how I'd design that. But it sounds fun! What appeals to me is the science/experimental aspect of it. Creating a self-sustaining system that creates little waste and uses few resources has always fascinated me. Also, I'm totally new to this and don't know very much about the science yet at all.

 

[MakNugget]

This, on a small scale, sounds like something that I need to explore as well.

I have sand in my run. Going into the second summer, the sand is somewhat polluted, and rinsing is starting to be less effective in keeping it clean.

My plan would be to do something like this: dump poopy sand into a bucket filled with water to make a tea, which can overflow into a tank with plants on top. I'm not sure if I'm up to farming fish yet...

 

[tragic59]

Can you post the link for the garden pool blog again?

 

[tragic59]

Nevermind. I figured it out. For some reason, when I was clicking on the link, it was getting jacked up by my computer for some reason.

I copied and pasted it into the address bar and it worked fine.

Thanks!

 

[AndrewDe]

Aquaponics works great. We have successfully run both meat birds as well as rabbits on our aquaponic produce at our organic research farm in lLewiston, South Australia and have successfuly almost eradicated 98% scours and Coccidia issues and developed SPF1 rabbits for home industry. Chickens do very well on aquaponic produce and organic mixed grains and we obtained 5 kg birds in 8.5 weeks and 2 kg rabbits in 43 days. more information is available at www.1AQUAPONICS.com.au for fish and veg production as well as other information etc.

Andrew Dezsery M.Sc
International Specialised Skills Institute Fellow
AUSVEG 2010 Finalist

 

[Xtina]

Thanks!