Getting Started

[shaun welland]

We have a former water plant in NC on the SC border. We live in the building and wish to use the tanks for a purpose and aquaponics seemed to be the perfect way to go. after working all winter we managed to get the tanks into a condition to hold and move water. We have one large round tank which is very deep and holds around 3000 gallons of water and a smaller rectangular tank closer to the building that holds about 1800 gallons of water. I have got the water system set up so that water pumps from the round tank uphill to the smaller rectangular tank. This water flows through about 8 separate jets to oxygenate it and it then returns to the round tank 50% via sluice and the other 50% returns to the round tank from the surface underground and back to the bottom of the round tank using gravity. What should I be doing next? I have a ph testing kit coming but I am just not sure what else I need to do at this stage. The water we use to fill and top the tanks off comes from an underground storage tank that has about 220,000 gallons of water that replenishes from a rain collection system. I can add photos if needed and welcome suggestions

[Michael Osman]

Wow! I can't speak for anyone else, but I'd love to see pictures

[Pam DeLong]

Yeah, what a score!!! Many here are likely envious!

Yes, pics and maybe videos of your progress as well! Hopefully, someone here lives close enough to you to give you some hands-on assistance.

Sounds like a super set-up to work with!

[shaun welland]

[shaun welland]

Having problems getting my pictures uploaded with try later thanks

[shaun welland]

Here are some pictures the first is the tank I wish to grow veg

[shaun welland]

[Pam DeLong]

SWEET!

[Luke Smith]

Wow! How did you land there?

You need to interrupt the sluice and maybe the underground system and insert your grow media letting the water flow through the grow system back to the fish tank. Lots of grow beds or deep water culture (DWC) if you have room for growing. You can also use nutrient film technique (NFT) in the return path. You can get some dense foam insulation panels and float on the upper tank for DWC. Without room you need to go with grow towers. put lots of fish in the 3K gal. tank. Fish that can handle lower water temps, Not Tilapia where you live. Go to youtube and look up "vertical grow towers" to make your own or go to Bright Agritech and order towers from them. Maybe you have room to do all the above.

Best of Luck. Keep us informed of progress.

[Michael Osman]

That's awesome! I hope you're able to do some big things with that.

[shaun welland]

Thank you we tested the water the week end and got ph 7.6. No 3 and No2 at 0 and Ammonia 0.50 so we decided to add 12 small gold fish to see how they fair. So far so good. They are in bucket with small holes suspended in tank.

[Jeff S]

That's a lot of water to heat so you're going to need to use fish that are common to the area. I would start on a much smaller scale and expand as you learn. Where are you in NC?