Here at Farm Fountain, we have created a small, 100 gallon aquaponics system to grow tilapia and leafy greens indoors. We hope you copy ours and/or develop your own. To learn how we made ours, visit the "HOW TO" link on our website: Farmfountain.com

We'd love to hear about your own set-ups!

Amy Youngs & Ken Rinaldo

Hi!

At last, you have forum!
I was quite happy, when I saw your project because I'm planning to build one similar to yours, but I haven't got any contact for my questions about it. For example I didn't know what kind of fish can I "grow", and what size of tank will I need.
So in the future I think I'll have lots of questions for you. Since then, congratulation for this project! That's great!

Greets from Hungary.

Skizo

Greetings Skizo!

The fish we are raising are Tilapia, because we could get them fairly locally and also they are an easy type to raise in an aquaponics system. I heard from Suburban Homesteader that they are raising Australian Red Claw Crayfish in their system. Tilapia are not legal in every country though, I've heard that they are not legal in Australia, for instance. It would be good to find out if you have any fish breeders locally that you can purchase fry from and then Google that type of fish to see if anyone is having luck with it in an aquaponics setup. When I was doing some research I found an aquaponics fish species list, which included the necessary temperature range for each type and it indicated which were easier and harder to raise. I don't remember which site it came from, but I've attached it to this message.

As for the size of tank: ours is 100 gallon. A farm extension faculty at Ohio State University told me that the general rule of thumb is that one gallon of water can support 1/3 pound of fish. Then, in your calculations you have to consider how big the fish get at full size, for Tilapia it is 1.5 pounds.

Let us know how it goes!

-amy

I am so impressed with this whole thing. It is functional and creative and beautiful. Congratulations on the great web-site set up with instructions and video etc. Very enticing.

Anne