Basement Aquaponics

[Sniper-T]

hmm. I forgot all about this thread. My bad!

Thanks Vodin!

[Vodin]

Wow, lunch was served.
Cut up a little Basil.
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Some Green Mustard, Spinach and Romaine lettuce.
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Added some Parmesan Cheese and Italian dressing.
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My wife and I enjoyed excellent fresh salads from the deep dark basement. This will be repeated tomorrow as well.

[bacpacker]

Now what! You trying to encourage me to build me a set up?

[Vodin]

Funny thing, it does not boil down to what you stock up. That will run out, it is what you can do. Of course you should do a set up. 300-800 fry can be born each month.. Fry to plate is 8 months. And Tilapia don't really have that fishy taste. Come on.. do it...

[bacpacker]

We've been talking about starting a small hydroponic unit to start. Shouldn't be hard to add on later.

[Vodin]

Hydroponics uses only chemicals to raise plants.

Aquaponics use fish to raise plants.

[bacpacker]

Yep, I just don't have the time for even a hydro system. When we do, it'll be a small.

[bacpacker]

We found a local Hydro/Aquaponic store and visited it today. They have all kinds of goodies. We ended up spending about 2 hours looking around and asking questions. Picked up a nice catalog that has lots of growing info included and a bunch of fliers and handouts with information. Getting ready to start doing some research cause I figured out in about 10 minutes I really have no clue.
Big thing is, the wife is totally on board with getting something going.

A couple of questions I have already been thinking about.
1) If using a Aquaponic system, what ongoing cost do you have besides seed, water, fish, and electricity? I know there will be some one time start up cost for pumps, containers, ect.
2) What is being used for lighting? What color light? Wattage? Does anyone grow outdoors during acceptable weather conditions? Helo, I know you were adding a building to contain yours in. Was it made to let in light (greenhouse)?

I'm sure I will have plenty more.

[helomech]

Really just electricity and replacing pumps and stuff. Fish food is a very small cost, unless you are feeding lots of fish. See cost is going to be very small also. I get water from rain, and my pond.


My green house is mainly for getting my tilapia to survive winter outside, and for some more tropical plants like orange trees, etc.

[bacpacker]

Thanks Helo. I thought that's kinda how you were using the greenhouse. I didn't think there would be large ongoing cost in an AP system. Hydro on the other hand, lets just say I was surprised at how high the cost were for the supplies. This after buying the set up to operate with.