halhurst's Four Barrel Fisherator garden

Garden Type: Aquaponic | Sun: Partial Sun | Soil: None | Organic

Rainwater, dew and shower runoff – solar heated – source of irrigation water, future home of my fish farm, now in development.

11/6/2011:

The current setup can be thought of as two parts- water collection and treatment, and a fish habitat.

The collection portion consists of the watershed south of the ridge line of my roof, extending over my patio via corrugated transparent polycarbonate roofing, collected and directed into the collection barrel(s). This water is used as replacement water for the fish habitat. When rainwater is not available, the first collection barrel serves as a conditioning tank for removing chloramines from tap water.
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The fish habitat contains most of the amenities necessary for warm-water fish in an intensive farming environment: heater, water filtration, aeration, lighting, and feeding.
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Water purity is maintained by circulating the water through the biofilter barrel to remove ammonia and by drawing off about 20% of the water and sediment per week for watering the garden. Replacement water comes from the collector barrel.
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Temperature control (heating) is provided by solar heat in the day and electricity at night. Barrels are insulated to minimize heat loss. Solar heat thermostat is set 10 degrees higher than night heat to allow some heat storage and minimize power use.
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Water circulation is provided with two pumps, which alternate between a solar heating loop when heat is required and solar coils are hot enough, and a short path which bypasses the coils and enables the night heater.
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Internal lighting is provided by strings of LED Christmas lights wrapped around the white poly barrel under the insulation.
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Aeration is provided by a central pump which supplies air for bubblers in each barrel, including the collection/ conditioning barrel. The bubblers are made of 1/4" soaker hose for drip irrigation.
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Feeding is manual at this point, but I am investigating an automated dispenser that will provide several feedings a day.

An outdoor organic garden located in 90250, United States, halhurst's Four Barrel Fisherator garden currently contains 0 plants.

This is a Aquaponic garden that is known to be in USDA Hardiness Zone 10a. It has mainly None soil and receives Partial Sun light.

Photos

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Comments

The_Sassy_Sower wrote:
No problems with mosquito breeding? What is the little tubing that I see? Does the rainwater go into the barrel from a gutter downspout?

Posted on 19 Apr 11 (about 2 years ago)
halhurst wrote:
There was a little mosquito problem that developed until I introduced some mosquito fish, free from my local mosquito abatement program. The tubing leads to an air stone aerator to prevent stinky anaerobic decay. After this picture was taken I routed the downspouts directly to this barrel. But more changes are in the wind as I progress to an aquaculture system.

Posted on 12 May 11 (about 2 years ago)
halhurst wrote:
November 6, 2011: Updated garden to include Four Barrel Fisherator for backyard tilapia farm.

Posted on 06 Nov 11 (over 1 year ago)
JGarfield wrote:
hal: how many fish do you keep in it? What species of tilapia are you raising?

Posted on 26 Mar 13 (3 months ago)
halhurst wrote:
@ JGarfield: mosambique tilapia. About a dozen to 20. Oreochromis Mossambicus is one of the few permitted in California. The colony is stable, but I plan to enable breeding pretty soon by moving the second generation upstream with the adults, and allow fry to survive in the downstream barrel. The whole operation would be improved by some larger tanks, like about 400 gallons, or better yet an open pond, but I just don’t have the space. Factoid: it’s hard to see, measure, or count fish at the bottom of a barrel, and netting them leads to sometimes lethal stress.

Posted on 26 Mar 13 (3 months ago)
JGarfield wrote:
I asked cause this spring i plan to set one up myself.. I don’t know what the legal status of having Tilapia in the state of KY as the laws read like build instructions of a space station in Japanese. I have sent a email to our “KDFWR” office to clarify the status of them for noncommercial use. If not legal then i will be looking into some other fish.

Posted on 27 Mar 13 (3 months ago)
halhurst wrote:
Here’s the crucial question: Can tilapia survive in the wild in your area? If the waters get below 50F in winter, chances are that your state will not be too concerned about tilapia getting into the ecosystem: they will not survive the winter. Florida, on the other hand, has a big tilapia problem. California bans all non-native tilapia, O. Mossambucus gets in because some fool salted the Salton Sea with them 100 years ago, after an engineering fiasco in an early water project created that lake.

If not tilapia, maybe catfish would work for you. I feed my tilapia catfish food which is easier to get. Sunlight on your pond will encourage algae, which tilapia are talented to strain out of the water, supplementing their nutrition.

There is a much more detailed account of my setup in some of my other journals of a year or two ago. And now I am considering a redesign of my own. But I highly recommend incorporating solar heating and rainwater collection in your setup. You can see how I have integrated this into my gardening setup.

Posted on 27 Mar 13 (3 months ago)
JGarfield wrote:
Well yes our water gets below that. I had been looking at catfish as well but not to much of a catfish fan (to gritty for my taste) My tanks would have to be kept in a metal building to keep the neighbors from helping themselves. I have a problem with that in my area they cleaned my plants one day while i was gone to the doctors with my dad.

I have a couple 250gal troughs as well as many plastic 55gal barrels & a couple 250gal poly Storage Tanks (The big square ones in a metal mesh frame). So i would be setting up as a recirculating style.

As for food i wondered if out of date dry cat/dog food would work for them i get that by the Gaylord load.

Posted on 27 Mar 13 (3 months ago)
halhurst wrote:
You got some bold neighbors there.

I would go for dog food over cat food because dogs are more omnivorous, as are tilapia. I keep thinking if I can get a cheap source of omega-3 in their diet (like algae) they will be healthier to eat. There is some question whether there is a distinction between feed for food animals vs that meant for pets. You may find the pet food does not meet USDA standards for animals raised as food. Heavy metals like lead, for instance, or some trace amounts of certain pesticides (DDT was notorious for this), will be concentrated and passed on to you if you feed it to your fish. So be careful.

I would go for the two 250 gallon tanks myself if I could get them through my entrance. From upstream to downstream, 250 gal growout tank, 250 gal breeding tank, 50 gallon nursery tank, 50 gal biofilter.

I made the water circulation gravity powered, with each tank about 4" lower than the previous one, connected by an overflow I will diagram for you if you want. My idea was, that in case of a leak or something, I wanted the water to stay in the habitat until it was pushed out by adding more. I was glad I did b/c shit happened, as it always does.

I needed 1 1/2 inch pipe to carry a suitable flow of water without backing up. I have some tricks for getting cheap waterproof bulkhead fittings to interconnect connect your tanks that you can use.

And, hey, you should use some of that cheap dog food to get yourself a guard dog. Warning, some like tomatoes. “Lycopersicum” means “wolf peach”.

Posted on 27 Mar 13 (3 months ago)
JGarfield wrote:
Bold isn’t the word for them… Lets just say 70% of my neighbors in a 1 mile area around me still think thier in Mexico & US laws don’t apply…. I’ll leave it at that cause on the biggest part they are good hard working familys but you know as well as i do there are always “Bad Apples”.

All the food i get is of the ‘all natural, Holistic’ brand so it isn’t the cheap stuff. We have been feeding the strays & raccoons. It wont bother me to purchase catfish food. But i really want to setup so the plants support the fish & the fish support the plants.

Posted on 27 Mar 13 (3 months ago)
halhurst wrote:
My take on it is, that though the water is purified by the plants, there’s still an energy input in the form of fish food and output in the form of people food. The wasted organic matter (beanstalks, carrot tops, lettuce roots, etc) can go into a worm compost bin and be turned into protein (and I have it from good Corey Lundeen of Dual Survival that worms are great nutrition) and be returned as fish food, but unless you can produce enough algae from sunlight you will end up fueling the cycle in some manner. BTW I haven’t found a way to get the worms to separate themselves from the soil without me picking them out.

Posted on 29 Mar 13 (3 months ago)