Hello, to the Wet Wild World of Aquaponics!

[Russian Trout 17]

hello all. I feel like I skipped out on this step.. and it would be nice to say hello to allllll
my names Anna, I attend SUNY ESF in good old Syracuse NY, and work the summers at Cabbage Hill Farm Aquaponic Greenhouse in Mount Kisco, NY. I am currently working on setting up a system to help feed the hungry here in syracuse, and starting drawing up plans to later be submitted for grants and such. I found this website and thought it was the most valuable resource.. because its based on pure experience. any tips and tricks i can pick up on the way from designers would be excellent.
- two 956 gallon tanks, stocked with tilapia fingerlings, aiming for stocking at 1/3 to half pound of fish, and to have the water turnover to be at an hour. planing on trying to run eleven 12 foot NFT's off of each tank, and have a gravel underlying collection for some extrrrrra sediment removal before returning to the tanks. (bead and biofilter in the works...)

[urbanfarmer]

Greetings Earthling, and welcome to the addiction!

What a coincidence. I was just looking at your University and others in the area... Professor Emeritus Martin P. Schreibman, Ph.D. brought my attention your way. Anyway, welcome! Please tell us some more about your plants! How far are you into your studies?

[keith_r]

yes, it sounds pretty interesting..
you'll need solids filtration between the fish tank and nft..
i'm starting my 3rd system (personal use only).. i try to turn my water over at least 1x/hour as well

[foodchain]

I was stationed in Ft Drum for two years. 4 hours after trade centers were hit I was airborne going over the poles to Afg. Got back, married my wife out of Morrisville...you probably know it best by Colgate Univ. My biggest concern with what you have mentioned is heat. Northern NY as I recall keeps snow on the ground like all but 2-3 months out of the year due to Lake Effect snow...maybe not so bad in Syracuse, I was a ways further north off the St Lawrence River. 1/3 lbs also is nowhere near what Tilapia can become, and at that size in my opinion do not make big enough fillets. Why not try Yello Perch? They mature fairly quickly, taste good, and have strong connections with aquaculture. Most importantly they like cold water, and eat most anything meaty. Just an idea. I am working on a similar plan here in TX, and if you want you can PM me and we can discuss further. Good Luck either way.

[foodchain]

That many feet of grow bed are going to radiate out a lot of heat in my opinion. Is this then in a greenhouse and maybe I just missed that part? Otherwise I think you are going to be looking at about a 1,000 watt heater, or maybe even two depending on how much water you really put into this system by the time you figure water in the NFT, in the volume tanks, filters, etc. Good news, they are readily available off of ebay at about $100/each with controller. I would suggest two though in case one failed. Run them both at the same time, just dialed down. IF one fails you can compensate with the second. That way neither is running at full strength. Just my 2 cents on it. But if it can go wrong, it almost always does for me.

[Russian Trout 17]

thanks for the info foodchain. and yes, in fact its going to be inside of a greenhouse.. and maybe even possibly within a larger building.. but again it all depends on how the design will fly for funding wise. perch you say eh.... never have raised them in a system, food to pound ratio at hand? the reason why i was thinking tilapia was for their "garbage" eating ways. mostly feed them soy wheat products, its more sustainable to produce food at that trophic level... but how cold hardy are they anyways?

[foodchain]

Conversion is going to depend on quality of feed. Some feed producers guarantee 3:1, 3 feed to 1 fish....but commercial feeds are expensive. Your costs are already going to be high, just being in NY compared to other states. I got my discharge when they were trying to pass "illegal not to recycle" law. Not sure if anything ever came out of it or not. But I wasn't sticking around to be told I HAD TO, or face fines. Anyway I am getting off topic. Perch are nice, one of the better tasting in my opinion, and have a high demand on the market as they are disappearing from the Great Lakes area. They are easy to breed, and you can even use an egg tumbler for hatching to gain more control, less labor though to just hatch on their own. Your conversion though, regardless of commercial, homemade, DIY or whatever will depend on the quality of it, but also the quality of your water parameters. The best feed can be fed to fish in the nasiest of water, and the owner gets mad because they don't grow as well. It's basically like farming....take the best care of the cow, and you get the best milk/beef. Abuse them....don't complain about what's on your plate. Contact the DNR, county extension agent, and Zetts fish farm....it's not far from you in Penn. They should get you a good start.

[foodchain]

Zetts fish farm got me started when I was in WA back in the 90's...they took the time to break it down and explain it well. I find I get better growth on most game oriented fish by balancing a food chain of more natural varieties than by commercial feed. Commercial feed though is readily available and if water parameters are consistant will get you consistant results....it loads into auto feeders well, which cuts labor costs. But, if you take the perch, and feed it live foods, minnows, etc and balance it that way I think you will have a better product. But, you will spend all your time breeding 'bait' and such. So which do you want to spend money on? Food, or labor? For me, MY labor is cheap. So I do absolutely everything I can myself. Though I often don't do it the best way, or most of effecient.....I am free, I have no minimum wage, no taxes, etc and I enjoy it. I am building an experiment, and hopefully will start trials on feeding feeder mice to breeder size tilapia/bass as it's a higher fat/protein content, and VERY cheap to produce. But I am producing, not buying. You have to be creative, ask questions, and try something. IF it doesn't work, as why? And modify your approach. And try again. Sound familiar to the scientific method? You can use worms, bugs, insects, bread, plant matter...etc. I have several DIY food recipies I can share, but it depends on what you are growing too. You don't feed Tilapia the same thing you feed channel catfish and expect to get same results. Fish have a food triangle if you will just like we do....you're seeking a balanced diet based on the nutritional needs of THAT species. Sometimes they are similar, sometimes they aren't. I don't have the exact break downs of protein %'s and the like right now, but I have a book case full of that data and can probably find what's recomended or you can google it for just about any aqucultured species and even the ornamentals these days.

[Basil1]

Question on that for foodchain. Not being that familiar with tilapia, are there any known issues with feeding warm blooded meat to them? Since that would not be part of a normal diet will they break it down and utilize the proteins properly?

[foodchain]

Outside me level of expertise. I have used cooked beef heart and liver. Not straight, in mixes to increase the protein content.
Especially popular with African cichlids, discus, and conditioning breeders.
The only way to know, is to try it, then perfect the percentages that get the best results. It may be worth opening up a thread or library type deal on here for the DIY recipes for food. I have some very good ones.