Comment

Comment by Dave & Yvonne Story on March 2, 2012 at 11:11am

cool

Best Teachers:

Great point. The problem as I see it is best intentions without experience. I watched a person on here swear a galvanized tank was good for a fish tank.. I felt sorry for the guy, taking it in as gospel. Finally, someone spoke-up about the ammonia leaching the metals into the fish water.

Now, I want to say.. I learn a great deal from this website, but I am cautious, if it is not backed-up by some experience. life is an experiment.

Comment by Holly Curtis on March 2, 2012 at 11:05am

PS  Thanks for the info on the fish food and report on the class.  I missed the post about the class until this morning.  I would like to go another time. 

Comment by Holly Curtis on March 2, 2012 at 11:04am

Chris George I want to grow algae to feed the fish and/or chickens.  I have no idea how to start, what is needed or where to get starter plants.  Would love some info on this.  GardenPool guy feeds green shag carpet like algae to his Tilapia and they seem happy on it and he said the chicken feces fed the algae...and I have chickens.

Comment by Chris George on March 2, 2012 at 10:51am

Also, I got my call back from Western Ranchman Feed Store with all of the tilapia feed pricing a couple of days after I posted I had contacted them for info.  I have lost my 'very' detailed notes....however, I will try to track them down and post the info for everyone.  What I recall off the top of my head is that there were 5 stages of feed.  The starter/grower being the most nutritious with added vitamins and ran $58 or so for a 50# bag.  The pricing decreased with each stage of growth, the last being $28 a bag.  All floating pellets of various size (I have all of that detail in my 'missing' notes).  They order from Star Milling every two weeks and all you have to do is place an order for what you want and it will come with their regular order (they currently stock a basic pond floater and the catfish floater I mentioned before).  I apologize for my disorganization....!  I have to add that I am learning LOADS of great information from all of you on the group....though I admit the more I learn the more I hesitate to dive in...I have limited resources ($) and can't afford to re-do and re-work if it means laying out more cash.  I really value all of you sharing your successes and challenges it is invaluable information.  Our unique challenge with mineral saturated water here in the valley is just one of the things that sets us apart from the rest of the aquaponics community, what works for them doesn't/might not here.  So, we are all the best teachers for each other.  Anyway, thanks!!

Comment by Chris George on March 2, 2012 at 10:40am

I attended the 'Owning Tilapia for Personal Consumption' class last night at the Merchant Firearms classroom.  Unfortunately, although 8 or so people RSVP'd...I was the 'only' attendee.  So, it was more of a 'shoot the bull' session between me and Dave Phelan (aka Dave the Tilapia Guy), and Sandra (aka Tukee Prepper) mostly listening.  Dave is an aquaponics/hydroponics consultant.  He works mostly with commercial growers and has developed a hybrid home system that he sells.  He brought a trailer with a couple of systems on it, a bell siphon system (two 2' square x 12" high beds, hydroton up top, fish tank below) and a version of his hybrid system (55 gallon drum fish tank with a 5" clear pipe laying across the top, 8' long or so, with 1" holes drilled down the length, so basically an NFT set up).  He was very knowledgeable especially about algae which he grows both for his own nutritional consumption and also to supply saltwater aquarium enthusiasts.  I would say he is the 'go to' guy for algae information.  He is a purist on fish nutrition and claimed that fish tested for nutritional content who were fed the Star Milling feed were equivalent to a cheeseburger (super fatty).  He mentioned AquaMax and I continued on voicing my desire to grow my own fish food (duckweed, etc.).  I failed to get any real details on feed.  I confess that our conversation strayed from aquaponics and/or tilapia farming/raising to my interests as an herbalist/urban farmer and my interest in biodynamic farming techniques....so, I didn't get nearly the amount of questions answered that all of you might be interested in.  He sells regular Nile tilapia and I did not get his pricing.  I told him I thought I would like to get a few from Dennis (gardenpool.org), a few from my buddy Sheri ;-) and maybe a few from him as well, to get a good cross going just for fun.  I am going to get some spirulina (blue-green) algae from him to grow for consumption and to try with the tilapia (2 different systems).  Dave Story - I am certainly not qualified as a 'judge', but I was satisfied with what I came away with.  He said he used to live in Tucson and knows you....can you comment on that?

Comment by Holly Curtis on March 2, 2012 at 10:30am

I am thinking about doing my first forray into adding plants to my fish system using a rain gutter filled with hydraton or lava.  My fish aquarium is a 55 gallons and I would run th rain gutter along the south facing wall of my house.  I guess I'll need to put shade over it shortly after.  I would just run water out of my 55 gal tank to the upper end of the rain gutter and let it flow out of the rain gutter back into the tank.  I might put it on a timer.  Undecided. Any thoughts on this?  It is so much simpler and smaller than what you are all doing....

Comment by Holly Curtis on March 2, 2012 at 10:18am

Sheri - is that class tonight. or was it last night?

Comment by Dave & Yvonne Story on March 2, 2012 at 9:24am

Re: Pad and Fan

UA is about to experiment with an off the grid greenhouse. Even the pad and fan are running on batteries. Seems to me they had a donation of the pad and fan from a business in Phoenix. If you are interested, I could find the address again.

Comment by Sheri Schmeckpeper on March 2, 2012 at 8:00am

Yeah, it might be a good class, or... who knows? I'd go for curiosity sake if I were free.

We have a Tradewinds Gadabout portable cooler (it looks like this: http://www.essickair.com/eac/eac/4_tw_gadabout_m300.htm but doesn't have a model number on it that I could access easily. I'll see if I can reach it later. They have 2 models.) We got it off a guy at Bob's work for a sweet price.

Comment by Dave & Yvonne Story on March 2, 2012 at 7:32am

I liked the videos. I put rocks along the walls to keep my pond liner in place. the Rock idea came from mark at Rhiba Farms. I can't remember if I did 10" or 12" deep. So mine was easy.. WOW.. each time I think about 4' high walls. I want to know more about how it is working. than k you

• ‹ Previous
• 1
• …
• 484
• 485
• 486
• 487
• 488
• …
• 558
• Next ›
• Page