Crazy things forum members do

[Sigidi]

Now I know this won't exactly be solely and wholly 'saw milling' but as it seems to have hijacked Pete's thread and I made wonderful use of my own milled timber (plus there isn't a section on the forum for this kind of thing) - I thought what the hay, chuck it in here - then Pete can have his thread back.

So I know Mike is into this and so is DerekH, I was talkin to rude the other day and am not 100% sure if he is or will be doin it.

Anyway, so here are some piccy's, doin a bit of site prep - nothing too large...






So then came some of that timber I had milled - anyone got ideas yet??



This is all the kids helpin out



My youngest 'helper' supervising, to make sure I was doing right



So this is the bottom, of what we where making. Now remember due to Mike (aka Burnsy) I haven't been sleeping since the weekend before last. Most nights I'm in bed with my mind racing, thinking about bell siphons, flood and drain cycles, ammonia levels, nitrobacter bleeding bacteria!!



So does anyone have a clue what is going on from these pics? Well if you don't you aren't the only one - we didn't have a clue either
This should give away what we where doing...



and this is the soon to be fish tank all pretty with plastic trimmed and capping on.



and then just for those who like a bit of landscape to their stories, this is where we tried to get suitable specimens to chuck in our new little fish tank



NB: forgot to tell everyone, the landscape pic is our dam, so I'm not trying to flog specimens from someone

[tea lady]

You're making a snow dome? Either that or the pics didn't load.

[Burnsy]

You're making a snow dome? Either that or the pics didn't load.

Here is my school system

My home experiment

And the school dirt garden

[pjt]

I cant see any of the pics either Allan, so I got nooooo idea what u doin What I can see is now I have to keep an eye out for tanks and pipe and pumps, Where am I gonna put it???

[Sigidi]

Still no pics for everyone? I can see 'em, is something wrong?

[snowyskiesau]

Still no pics.

[Sigidi]

oooh, yeah I see what ya mean, I just deleted temp int files and cookies then refreshed the page - no pics.

Ok, had an issue during posting of thread, will rectify...

[Sigidi]

ok, pics are up now Phew! sorry

[derekh]

Here's a pic of my system and one of what happens when you get extended power outages like after the storms we had in Brisbane and you don't have backup power. I'm lucky, I only lost 20 Silver Perch out of 80.

It's a great little side hobby that is very addictive. I've had a system for two years and it has evolved over time. Mine is flood and drain, 15 minutes on 45 off 24/7 and I use 20mm drainage gravel and a 2000 litre pond.

cheers
Derek

p.s. I added the cover after a visit from some Ibis.

[Sigidi]

Hey Derek, there is a big variation in your Silver perch size (sorry to hear they went fin up) did you get them from 50mm fingerlings? and how long from fingerlings to when the black out dropped them?

[rude]

Hey sigidi,

the different sizes are a good thing because you can just pick the biggest ones for eating ( might need your grading ticket for this).What sort of fish are you going to grow ? i'm still in the set up stage but will be growing jade perch (barcoo grunter) as they have a higher omega 3 oil content than any other fish ,not bad for a little aussie native and are well suited to tank culture.
Rude.

[Sigidi]

Before we get to the pics I'll try and quickly explain what the heck is going on.
You get aquaculture, intensively growing fish to sell as either fingerlings for people to grow or to grow the fish to sell as food. The problem with aquaculture over the years has been all the Ammonia the fish excrete and all the extra water needed to keep the fish growing area clean, but the bonus is the fast growth rate and amount of fish which can be grown.

You also get hydroponics, which is great for growing plants without soil, the problem with this is, you have to keep chucking a heap of chemical as fertiliser/nutrients in to the water to help the plants grow, but it does produce a heck of a lot of plants for a little amount of used water.

So then you get Aquaponics; a blending of the good sides of Aquaculture and Hydroponics, without the downsides of each. The ammonia build up from the fish tank is filtered through growing beds, good, little, naturally occuring bacteria live in these growing beds. The gravel in the grow beds filter the water and the bacteria take up the ammonia. The water returns to the fish tank, filtered, cleaned of the toxic ammonia and aerated, this is very good for the fish. Meanwhile back in the growbed, the bacteria convert the ammonia into Nitrite and then Nitrate, this nitrate is then available to the plant so the plants can grow lush, large and fast. This way you don't use anywhere near as much water as in traditional aquaculture, your plants are all organic as you don't use all the chemical fertiliser/nutirents associated with hydroponics, the growth results for both fish and plants is wonderful. The best bit, this system can keep going as long as there are plants and fish, all year round. Having said all this, you don't have to eat the fish, you could just have goldfish or ornamental fish if you just wanted the garden side of aquaponics.

So here is a few more pics, I know you all like pics

This is one of the growbeds - 2mx0.5mx350mm made from 30mm slabs of hoop pine if you recall, I cut back in november last year The magpies seem to sit on everything we make around here, as soon as we make something it's as if the magpies think we made it for them.



The top growbed is in place and planted up with herbs and lettuce, tomato, baby carrots - all the kind of stuff Wifey can use in the kitchen. The kitchen is through the left hand door; nice and easy. The bottom grow bed, in place, but without it's nice pretty facing - the boss thought solid slabs of hoop pine looked a bit 'home made' so she came up with the idea of the neat facing.



We like crayfish and fish, so we've devised a system to keep crayfish as well as fish. Did you know crays are little Houdini's, eveyone of them? They will shimmey their way up the pumps power cable and out the tank if left to their own devices, have even been known to pile on top of each other to escape!!



So our solution has been, to house a male and a few females in 0.5sqm containers, holes drilled all around them to allow water flow and air, pipes in each container to give little hiding spots and gravel in the bottom of each one too.

So this is the system set up with the two grow beds finished and tidy. We have just filled the bottom growbed (yeaterday arvo/last night) and are waiting on our pump before we can get this growbed 'online' and planted



So what do you guys think of the concept? It's not a new thing, it's been around for ages, but for us having dinner fresh, organic, just outside the door of the kitchen and the fish costing something like $3.50 per kilo and the vegies just being a freebie from the $3.50 kilo of fish, who could complain?

[silentC]

Any ideas on how much electricity one of these set ups uses? I've been thinking of doing it, got heaps of room, but I don't need to be using any more juice at present.

Must say I like the idea though. I wonder if the pumps could be run off solar?

[tea lady]

I love the idea. Will have to investigate it for our joint.

[Sigidi]

Hey sigidi,

the different sizes are a good thing because you can just pick the biggest ones for eating ( might need your grading ticket for this).What sort of fish are you going to grow ? i'm still in the set up stage but will be growing jade perch (barcoo grunter) as they have a higher omega 3 oil content than any other fish ,not bad for a little aussie native and are well suited to tank culture.
Rude.

Hey Rude!! How ya going mate?

The boss was thinking of Jade perch because of their reported fast growth, some say will grow twice as fast as silvers... we did a bit of looking into it as we have more time than anything and didn't want to spend $100 on 100 fish to find it didn't work or something worse, the DanG things die.

So from DPI research Jade perch; http://www2.dpi.qld.gov.au/fishweb/14076.html
There is a narrow range where optimum growth rates occur which is probably 22oC to 28oC. Growth is negligible below 20oC. Marketable fish of 350 to 800gms can be grown in 8 to15 months in ponds
stocking rates for growout should be up to a maximum of 15 000 fish per hectare.
Growth rates decline rapidly when water temperatures fall below 20oC. Handling fish below 17oC may cause mortalities. Large-scale mortalities have occurred at temperatures in ponds below 13oC.
The food conversion ratios... for growout is 1.6:1. So you need 1.6kg of food for 1kg of fish

Silver perch; http://www2.dpi.qld.gov.au/fishweb/2703.html
Temperature tolerance ranges from 2°C to 35°C. Optimum growth rates occur between 20°C to 30°C.
Marketable fish of 400 to 600 grams can be grown in 10 to12 months.
stocking for growout at 5 000 to 21 000 fish per hectare.
The Food conversion ratio... for grow out is 1.5:1

So we looked at the two fish, knowing we have an outdoor, un-heated fish tank, this morning the water was 13.7deg, so with Jade's, they wouldn't be feeding and/or growing, worse still we could/would have lost a heap. The silvers would still be growing and their optimum growing temp is a lot more forgiving. The other things like increased stocking density, lower food conversion ratio are a bonus, but the most important for us, is the fish tank temp, I don't want to run 600 or 900W of heaters to keep the Jade's alive, when I can do without the heaters for silvers.

Hey maybe you could do a trial with Jades and see what temps they will do, I'd be happier to take first hand experience from someone who actually did it, than some words anyone could type up online???