Aquaponics Digest - Tue 01/26/99
Message 1: Re: converting anaerobic into aerobic condition
from jilli and lars
Message 2: Re: Breeding tilapia
from "charliec"
Message 3: Re: converting anaerobic into aerobic condition
from doelle
Message 4: RE: aquaponic swimming pool
from "Donna Fezler"
Message 5: RE: aquaponic swimming pool
from "Donna Fezler"
Message 6: RE: aquaponic swimming pool
from "Donna Fezler"
Message 7: Re: aquaponic swimming pool(xperimental)
from William Evans
Message 8: Re: aquaponic swimming pool(xperimental)
from "Jorg D. Ostrowski"
Message 9: RE: aquaponic swimming pool
from "Jorg D. Ostrowski"
Message 10: Re: aquaponic swimming pool(xperimental)
from Adriana Gutierrez
Message 11: flowforms pools (xperimental)
from William Evans
Message 12: Breeding Tilapia in small tanks
from "Paul T. Juckniess"
Message 13: Re: Breeding Tilapia in small tanks
from Adriana Gutierrez
Message 14: Re: Breeding tilapia
from Chris Hedemark
Message 15:
from Anna Jóna
Message 16: Unsubscribe
from Anna Jóna
Message 17: Unsubscribe
from AmazonFish
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| Message 1 |
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Subject: Re: converting anaerobic into aerobic condition
From: jilli and lars
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1999 22:42:42 -0800
doelle wrote:
> Very simple. Guide them through an anaerobic digester [polyethylene
tubing], or aerate your container. In the first case you get rid of most of
your 'baddies' and in the latter case [more expensive] you do the same.
horst and others-
I've briefly read the articles on the implementation if these
polyethylene tube digesters in vietnam and phillipines - very encouraging -
an extremely powerful technology that is (apparently) simple. But the articles
are lacking in terms of specific digester design parameters. What are these
polyethylene tubes like? diameter? thickness of plastic? are they made from
a narrow sheet formed into a tube? what sort of adhesive is used?
How is the gas collected? temperature regulation? how is it stored?
I'm familiar with much of the biogas basics - what i'm interested in is
simplicity and materials availability. I've been itching to build a
small scale digester to get a feel for working with them. I prefer
to work with found materials - there is so much stuff on the streets of san
francisco. I see abandoned plastic 5 and even 55 gallon drums all the time .
Can i use these for a digester? What about a thermophilic
digester? How do these plastics act at 140 -150 deg F? Does anyone know? Has
anyone used those cylindrical white 5 gallon plastic food/paint containers
under similar conditions? Are there any special considerations for
adhesives and/or fittings at such termperatures?
lars fields
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Subject: Re: Breeding tilapia
From: "charliec"
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 04:19:43 -0500
Help! |I am considering adding fish to balance my hydropnic operation and am
seeking a book or other source of basic info such as water temps for
various species, # of fish/ gal or feet3, water chemistry etc. etc. Thanks
-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Hedemark
To: aquaponics@townsqr.com
Date: Monday, January 25, 1999 6:49 PM
Subject: Breeding tilapia
>Lloyd R. Prentice wrote:
>
>> Well, in effort to move us back on track, let me pose two questions that
>> I've asked before, but with insufficient response to move ahead:
>>
>> 1) I'd like to try my hand at breeding tilapia in a very small way. Can
>> I do this in a twenty-gallon aquarium set-up? How?
>
>I don't think this is sufficient. It will be a LOT of work to keep the
>fish alive in 20 gallons at adult breeding size. I suggest getting
>something more like a 40 gallon or larger container. Low is preferable
>to tall (more surface area the better). For low budget, look towards
>Rubbermaid at the nearest Walmart for a suitable container.
>
>> 2) Where can I get the breeders? To start with, at least, I don't need
>> blue-ribbon stock.
>
>Sometimes pet shops have them. You will pay through the nose this way.
>I suggest getting with one of the tilapia farmers on this list (there
>are several) and try to get them to ship you some fingerlings.
>
>I have personally been trying my hand at raising Pacu as food fish.
>Word of warning - they are extremely flighty even into their adulthood.
>The tank must be well covered.
>
>Lloyd you are going into an area where you will likely get more good
>info from hobbyists than from farmers. Breeding tilapia is a whole
>different world from raising them for food. Check out the usenet
>newsgroup rec.aquaria. Tilapia are actually very easy to breed (most
>tilapia farmers go to great pains to KEEP them from breeding!) so most
>of your education will need to be on how to keep the adults healthy
>until they breed and how to care for their offspring. There is a wealth
>of information on this subject in the aquarium hobbyist community.
>
>I wrote an article a few years ago on filtration in the cichlid
>aquarium. I no longer have my copy but I know there are *ahem* illegal
>copies out there republished without my permission. Heh. The one site
>that republished the article *with* my permission is
>
>http://trans4.neep.wisc.edu/~gracy/fish/pages/general/filter.article.html
>
>It is geared more towards the hobbyist but this is the scale you need to
>think on if you are pairing off tilapia. Think of it as a high level
>overview. At the time I wrote that article there weren't many people
>using fluidized bed filtration. I've seen it in use since then in small
>to large scale configurations and it seems to work very nicely so it
>should be considered as well.
>
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Subject: Re: converting anaerobic into aerobic condition
From: doelle
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 21:14:31 +1100
Jilli and Lars,
> I've briefly read the articles on the implementation if these
polyethylene tube digesters in vietnam and phillipines - very encouraging -
an extremely powerful technology that is (apparently) simple. But the articles
>are lacking in terms of specific digester design parameters. What are these
polyethylene tubes like? diameter? thickness of plastic? are they made from
a narrow sheet formed into a tube? what sort of adhesive is used?
Why don't you contact the people in Vietnam via email or write to the
Filipinos in teh Research Institute. You will get the answers. I am also
sure that Prof.F.Dolberg will give you the answer you require. His email
address is: <
Prof. Dolberg is at the University of Aarhus. Your best team, however, is
the one in Vietnam. You can get the address for T.R.Preston from the webpage
http://www.cipav.org.co/lrrd/lrrdhome.html
Since they are building them, they should be able to give you the answers
you require. I have only seen them.
>How is the gas collected? temperature regulation? how is it stored?
That is very easy to answer. You have to have a connection through the
polyethylene digester top and a tubing goes into a second polyethylene tube
or container for gas collection.
> I'm familiar with much of the biogas basics - what i'm interested in is
simplicity and materials availability. I've been itching to build a
small scale digester to get a feel for working with them. I prefer
>to work with found materials - there is so much stuff on the streets of san
francisco. I see abandoned plastic 5 and even 55 gallon drums all the time .
Can i use these for a digester? What about a thermophilic
>digester? How do these plastics act at 140 -150 deg F? Does anyone know?
Has anyone used those cylindrical white 5 gallon plastic food/paint
containers under similar conditions? Are there any special considerations for
>adhesives and/or fittings at such termperatures?
>
If you do that, please watch that a good biogas producing digester works
only if the C/N ratio is right. If your carbon content is too high, you have
problems with acidity and would have to throw lime into it to neutralise it.
I have seen such systems in Thailand using the USAB type digester. The cost
of neutralising was huge.
Keep your itching going and get the detailed information from the above people.
Best of luck
Horst Doelle
Horst W.Doelle, D.Sc., D.Sc. [h.c.]
Chairman, IOBB
Director, MIRCEN-Biotechnology
FAX: +617-38783230
Email: doelle@ozemail.com.au
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Subject: RE: aquaponic swimming pool
From: "Donna Fezler"
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 06:45:19 -0600
Interesting comments I received. I think a small living machine marsh
environment between the pool and the fish, and the beds and the pool is in
order.
Algae control can be achieved by heating the water in black tanks instead of
the pool proper. The use of deciduous plants around the pool and/or a pool
cover in a crisis should work. When I lived in Louisiana I would use a few
dozen water hyacinths (they did not even cover 1/10 of the surface) over the
winter and I did not have algae growth, even without the use of chlorine.
They may have and inhibitory effect.
This is red and underlined on my computer and I can't effect any changes.
If it comes across this way, my apologies.
-----Original Message-----
Charcoal filtration is often used in fish-rearing systems, and probably will
have no negative affect on the fish or plants. Wonder if UV exposure would
have any affect on your bacterial levels...at least those that keep your
aquaponics system in balance?
>I swim in lakes, why can't I swim in this water?
Should be safe for swimming, but I guess the decision to use it that way
might have some bearing on the ultimate plans for your fish and plants. I
can foresee some possible complications if you intend to raise edible plants
and market these products.
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Subject: RE: aquaponic swimming pool
From: "Donna Fezler"
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 06:50:11 -0600
Yes, your perfectly correct. But there is still bacteria in the water, and
that is what kind of worries me about swimming in the used nutrient soup.
Michael, not all bacteria is bad. The majority of bacteria are harmless.
The significant water pathogens can be monitored fairly cheaply.
Yes.. I understand. However; while most bacterias in an aquaponics system
have bengin effects on humans, some do, for example e.coli or something
similar if you were to add manures to your beds for some reason.
I do add manure to the beds-fish manure. I will not add any other manure to
this system. As far as Chlorine goes, it is not the carcinogenic problems
that concern me, it is the immune system problems and the way it would
unbalance the system. It is totally out of the question and was one of the
original criteria. There is no reason to "sterilize" the water.
Donna Fezler
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Subject: RE: aquaponic swimming pool
From: "Donna Fezler"
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 06:55:33 -0600
Thanks, I will keep this in mind. It is incredible what other people think
of.
Donna
-----Original Message-----
From: aquaponics [SMTP:aquaponics]
On Behalf Of Wendy Nagurny
Sent: Monday, January 25, 1999 6:06 PM
To: Aquaponics
Subject: Re: aquaponic swimming pool
I can see no reason why you can't swim in you aquaponics water as long as
you were careful to avoid lotions, creams, deodorants, detergents, etc on
yourself. You don't want these things in your aquaponics system. I don't
think I would try to market anything grown in something my family swam in
either, but if the produce is just for your own consumption, why not? When
I read the original post, I thought it would be great to swim and play with
my fishies. I don't think your fish water would hurt you. You are already
eating the plants grown in it and the fish that swim there. Like I said, my
concern would be more for you hurting them with the anointments of modern
society then they hurting you.
Wendy
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| Message 7 |
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Subject: Re: aquaponic swimming pool(xperimental)
From: William Evans
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 06:12:49 -0800
As far as the inlet to the pool, couldn't this be done w/ perforated
drain tile (3-4" dia) buried w/ coarse rock......ie the bottom of the
pool is built using finer grades of rock and sand separated by
geotextile fabric to stop migration of sand rock into different
layers..The flow of water would be upward.This I HAVE NOT DONE.
But that is how they cleanse water at some watertreatment plants is it
not? AS long as no chlorine was used the rock and sand would support
the good nitrifying bacteria population for cleansing puprpose, right?
In Bill Mollisons book"Permaculture, A Designer's Manual" he lays this
all out only in reverse...
......effluent from the pool(sorry he doesnt have hooked into a
fishtank) he sucks downward thru similar graduated gravel/sand
bed/perforated pipe.. dumps/pumps this water uphill, where it gravity
flows thru some reed beds that are layed out in a convoluted fashion to
maximize the lenth of travel thru this growing bed(slow flow thru this
stage is essential to allow for absorbtion/conversion of the nasties to
goodies;i guess this works in concert w/ nitrifying bacteria, I guess
similar cleansing process you all depend on in your setups-only your
growing plants in gravel/medium dependent on nitrifying bac))...After
going thru the "reed beds" the water flows downhill over a series of
"flow forms" as he calls them, basically a series of sssmall waterfalls
to oxygenate the water afore it splashes into the pool,This completes
the path....No chlorine, no fish either, tho if the system wass
perfected I dont see why not as long as all variables in line w/ the
load/demands on the system.He does advise that tests for presence of E.
coli essential.
billevans
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
same as below---fabric and finer grade of sand
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
same as below --fabric and finer grade of rock or
coarse sand
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
overlay this w/ a "geotextile"/ filterfabric barrier
and a smaller grade of rock
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
coarse rock
-===== ======== ========== ========== =========== ========== ======
====== ======= ======= ===== ====== ===
perforated drain pipe(inlet to pool)
============================================================================
===================================
Donna Fezler wrote:
>
> Interesting comments I received. I think a small living machine marsh
> environment between the pool and the fish, and the beds and the pool is in
> order.
>
> Algae control can be achieved by heating the water in black tanks instead of
> the pool proper. The use of deciduous plants around the pool and/or a pool
> cover in a crisis should work. When I lived in Louisiana I would use a few
> dozen water hyacinths (they did not even cover 1/10 of the surface) over the
> winter and I did not have algae growth, even without the use of chlorine.
> They may have and inhibitory effect.
>
> This is red and underlined on my computer and I can't effect any changes.
> If it comes across this way, my apologies.
>
> -----Original Message-----
>
> Charcoal filtration is often used in fish-rearing systems, and probably will
> have no negative affect on the fish or plants. Wonder if UV exposure would
> have any affect on your bacterial levels...at least those that keep your
> aquaponics system in balance?
>
> >I swim in lakes, why can't I swim in this water?
>
> Should be safe for swimming, but I guess the decision to use it that way
> might have some bearing on the ultimate plans for your fish and plants. I
> can foresee some possible complications if you intend to raise edible plants
> and market these products.
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Subject: Re: aquaponic swimming pool(xperimental)
From: "Jorg D. Ostrowski"
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 08:31:40 -0700 (MST)
Bill: Thanks for the useful note as attached. The key words are:convoluted
path, slow flow, plants, and waterfalls. We have such a system but want to
improve it by graduating to higher volumes and faster treatment by using
more efficient (edible) plants and creating a more circuitous path and
having more splashing along the way. Is anyone else working on this? Where
can I find out more information based on experience? Jorg ostrowski
__________________________________________________________________________
You said:effluent from the pool(sorry he doesnt have hooked into a
fishtank) he sucks downward thru similar graduated gravel/sand
bed/perforated pipe.. dumps/pumps this water uphill, where it gravity
flows thru some reed beds that are layed out in a convoluted fashion to
maximize the lenth of travel thru this growing bed(slow flow thru this
stage is essential to allow for absorbtion/conversion of the nasties to
goodies;i guess this works in concert w/ nitrifying bacteria, I guess
similar cleansing process you all depend on in your setups-only your
growing plants in gravel/medium dependent on nitrifying bac))...After
going thru the "reed beds" the water flows downhill over a series of
"flow forms" as he calls them, basically a series of sssmall waterfalls
to oxygenate the water
___________________________________________________________________________
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| Message 9 |
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Subject: RE: aquaponic swimming pool
From: "Jorg D. Ostrowski"
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 08:38:25 -0700 (MST)
Donna: Are you saying that the water hyacinth prevented algae growth? I
hope not since mine are helping to clean my greywater, I need my algae to
feed my fish. I wonder if it may have been the low winter light levels?
Jorg Ostrowski
________________________________________________
You said: " When I lived in Louisiana I would use a few
dozen water hyacinths (they did not even cover 1/10 of the surface) over
the winter and I did not have algae growth,.."
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Subject: Re: aquaponic swimming pool(xperimental)
From: Adriana Gutierrez
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 10:46:21 -0500
Jorg D. Ostrowski wrote:
>
> Bill: Thanks for the useful note as attached. The key words are:convoluted
> path, slow flow, plants, and waterfalls. We have such a system but want to
> improve it by graduating to higher volumes and faster treatment by using
> more efficient (edible) plants and creating a more circuitous path and
> having more splashing along the way.
Jorg,
The June/July issue of Aquaponics Journal had an article entitled
"Ornamental Pond Aquaponic System". This may help you. The
author, Scott Jones used to participate on this list and is a
supplier of some the needed parts. You can get back issues of
the Journal at: www.aquaponics.com
Adriana
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Subject: flowforms pools (xperimental)
From: William Evans
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 08:16:21 -0800
Mollison's "flow forms"(((FF)))intrigue me..He stacks several of these
w/ a drop of a foot or so between each. "flowform"..... looks like a
circle basically (top view) that tried to split into siamese twins, but
didn't quite make it.
The FF's definately are puckered in on one side where agua pours off
into the next FF. The resultant xcrossection...from the rim to the
center axis... ( "siamese line"(diameter)) ,the bottom drops only to
rise again at this line. The result is a water flow that
alternates/oscillates back and forth in the basins, 2 basins per FF
separated by this "siamese line". This natural turbulent flow, combined
w/ the water drop between FF's greatly enhances the aeration and
resultant cleansing of the water.
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Subject: Breeding Tilapia in small tanks
From: "Paul T. Juckniess"
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 16:12:34 -0600 (CST)
Breeding tilapia in small tanks will depend on the size of the
fish. I had a trio (1 male ,2 females) that were very prolific
in a 29 gallon tank. The fish were small 6 to 7 inches in overall
length. Temperature seems to be an important about 80 F worked well
for me. I used a flower pot in the bottom of a bare tank. I feed them
catfish chow. The only thing that you need to look out for is
the males can be very agressive and hard on a female who is holding
eggs. At these times I would remove the male from the tank.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul T. Juckniess III | Thunder is impressive. But it is
pjucknie@mail.coin.missouri.edu | lightning that does the work.
Voice: (573) 886-1214 | Mark Twain
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| Message 13 |
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Subject: Re: Breeding Tilapia in small tanks
From: Adriana Gutierrez
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 18:04:41 -0500
The only thing that you need to look out for is
> the males can be very agressive and hard on a female who is holding
> eggs. At these times I would remove the male from the tank.
Some breeders cut the upper lip off of the males for this
reason. I don't know if I could do this but it apparently comes
with the territory. Sort of like castrating bulls, I guess. You
guys need to get your aggression under control...:>
Adriana
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| Message 14 |
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Subject: Re: Breeding tilapia
From: Chris Hedemark
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1999 18:34:38 -0500
charliec wrote:
> Help! |I am considering adding fish to balance my hydropnic operation and am
> seeking a book or other source of basic info such as water temps for
> various species, # of fish/ gal or feet3, water chemistry etc. etc. Thanks
>From Amazon.com:
Home Aquaculture
by Steven D. Van Gorder
Our Price: $18.95
Paperback (May 1983)
Rodale Pr; ISBN: 0878574727
Feed Management in Intensive Aquaculture
by Stephen Goddard
Our Price: $87.95
Availability: This title usually ships within 2-3 days.
Hardcover (March 1996)
Chapman & Hall; ISBN: 0412070812 ; Dimensions (in inches): 0.63 x 9.31 x
6.18
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