maxim_nz

Just to counter the latest photos at the end of a goldfishes life, here is a photo at the start of some goldfishes lives.. A photo of the growing goldfish eggs in my deep water culture bed, there are probably more unfertile eggs than viable and growing ones. There are also noticibly richer (gold) coloured eggs than others. You can work out the eyes, and the main backbone. While I was looking at these with a magnifying glass, one of the developing fry inside the egg did a flip.. so cool to see. Now I figure out how to feed them in a few days time..

I lost a one or two a week last season in my aquaponics pond (probably lost 10 or 12 total) as it warmed up and feeding started.. once I completely cleaned my sump (bathtub) right out, no more deaths at all. So this season I cleaned out sump once again at end of winter (added some shrimp to live and clean the sump) and gone to a mostly home made vege diet rather than shop bought diet. I've had one die over the same period as last seasons disaster, and just had 3 days of spawning :-)

Adrienne: sounds interesting, any photo would do if you have one.. Goldfish: This is now the 3nd day of spawning, they are laying eggs all through the mint, and with this many hungry goldfish around I bet most have been eaten, tried to save as many as I could and they can grow out in the deep water culture mussel bouy with tomatoes and lettuces. 20C yesterday in Wellington. I guess that triggered them..

Big goldfish and aquaponics go together well in NZ.. If my big bronze goldfish was a snapper it would almost be a keeper.. and I've seen bigger as well.

So how hard would it be to catch these big orange goldfish??

Couple of quick picture updates at the start of the growing season.. Overview (wide angle) view of goldfish pond Goldfish Pond (Oct 2015) Overview of the 2 x mussel bouys - 1 as a media growbed and other as deep water culture Growbeds Goldfish: (underwater) picture of some of the big ones. Small white one you can see on left is typical shop sized fish for sale. big goldfish All healthy, nice stable system at the moment. Have moved goldfish to a home made diet (cooked carrot, broccoli, rice, spinach) + bugs, snails etc. Doing well. As well as the plants and Goldfish this eco-system comprises of worms, fresh water snails, fresh water shrimp (in the sump) the occasional frog and quite a few bugs, spiders Nice to see a few other kiwis having fun with alternative gardening also :-)

I have looked at this extensively - there in no other practical option in NZ to use anything but Goldfish for aquaponics. You could use common large growing tropical fish that you can legally buy in pet shops, but I'm not sure I would want to eat those. You should not eat Goldfish anyway. Just use them to grow your plants. Tropical fish = heating costs but all year round waste producers Goldfish = no heating costs, minimal waste output over winter months The brown bullhead catfish which is a pest spread throughout the Waikato would be a great option for NZ aquaponics. Apparently they taste nice if fed a decent (clean) diet and not scavenging off unknown river waste. I think DOC are unlikely to allow this to anyone but a serious commercial venture under strict control, so back to the Goldfish option..

Wellington: Visited Korokoro Stream @ night recently (entrance off Cornish Street) and it took only a few minutes with a torch to find them (eyes reflect like little cats eyes do in the dark)

Update December 2014 (this is my continuing small scale aquaponics experiment. Done at altitude in cold, windy Wellington using recycled parts + goldfish, snails and worms) -Changes over winter I removed the small growbed and replaced with half a Coromandel Mussel Buoy (broken one off a farm, bit tricky getting this back to Wellington in sedan car) Nice and deep now for Tomato roots, needed another 100 litres of hydroton to top it up on top of existing media. There is a nice population of worms in the growbed also and freshwater snails in the sump. Both supplement the goldfish food. Overview Mussel Buoy sits on top of sump (bathtub) End on view I also replaced my somewhat fiddly deep water culture trough with 2 x hydroponics gulleys and I'm testing lettuces, chillies, strawberries, Onions, and odds and ends in. I got 7 x gullies = $15 off trademe :-) ONION: doing good, hope to get some seed off it. RED ROCOTO CHILLI I have other seedlings if anyone wants one. They are a fabulous addition to a Lamb curry LETTUCES: Seems to me to be the BEST way at growing lettuces fast compared to soil garden, grow media or deep water culture. I place these guys in netpots with roots wrapped in coconut fibre, they are much better supported this way and don't get blown around in Wellington wind compared to the deep water culture. They just go nuts. We leave them growing and take leaves off as needed for salads. FISH! Doing good now, had a few deaths as I tried to get them back on a good food regime after winter, would be good to know how others do winter feeds and then get them back into condition and producing lots of waste, water clarity is fantastic and never any issue. I love sitting watching and feeding them. Most other aquaponics setup I see on youtube seem to hide them away :-( SNAILS: Nuisance, they seem to love destroying the sunflower seedlings at night :-( OTHER CASUALTIES: This poor guy fell into the (sump) bathtub and was long gone when I found him.. INDOOR WINTER TEST OF TOMATO I took the last growing tomato plant inside in June 2014 and popped it into the tropical tank. In no time it completely outgrew the warm air space under the light, so I let it bush right out and I took 10 or more cuttings of it - cuttings are now back outside and flowering nicely... WHAT TO DO NEXT: Long term it need a solids filter, so will figure something out.. lots of examples on youtube.

My "indoor area" aquaponics has been voted an acceptable place by a member of the New Zealand Wildlife Community. This frog has been living in the deep water bed that previously had the winter lettuce growing. It sunbathes on the black plastic edging, and will jump in when you go out to feed the goldfish, hang out the washing, get some tomatoes etc. It's been here last 2 weeks, there are plenty of spiders and flies living around the system, so hope it hangs around a bit longer. No goldfish seem to the missing either.

My goldfish powered tomatoes are now 2.4M high (17 Dec 2013) Here's what they looked like on 14th Sept 2013 The deep water culture tub. Very easy to grow lettuces.. anyone could do this. Bathtub and plants on left / pond on right. Bathtub acts as sump. All water goes back here Experiment: moss scraped off concrete outside grows lush and deep Fish. I did have parsley growing in here also, but I planted it outside in a large tab where it gets more all round sunlight and feed it all the used ground coffee beans. They are now massive. AQUAPONICS: This is purely just done for fun and learning how to grow the most I can in the smallest space with the least amount of water :-) - I just got sick of cleaning filters and stumbled across this on the web. Filtration is achieved by settlement of solids into the bathtub and growbed. Worms and snails break these down. Water clarity is excellent.

FISH PICS :f77: These guys are what makes the plants grow. They always want food. Nice and friendly The kids have nicknamed this big black male "batman" on account of big flowing black fins and the more prominent nostrils like bat ears..

My small (hydroton) grow bed. Bell Siphon, flood and drain. Good view of avocado, parsley and new season tomatoes Closer view of the bell siphon with cap removed. Strawberries: Grown in milk bottles with dripper. Left one if full of hydroton clay media and very well established, the two right ones are new setup using strawberries from the deep water tray and full of coconut fibre. These two are much lighter..

ok. Overall view of setup. New bath and deep water culture is at top, long white pipe beside pond is cleaned water from sump (bath) into pond. Closer view of deep water culture (basically plants on a polystyrene raft with roots directly in water). Adaptation is elevating the polystyrene with a air gap above the water, gives root oxygen without need of water bubblers most commonly done in these setups. Strawberries cultivating on the raft (under view of roots) all the clean white roots are new growth in 1 month

yeah, grown from the stone which was simply placed in the growbed and ignored. When I read about avocado (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avocado) it appears to be tropical, grows to 20M in height and likes well aerated soils. I've hardly given it any special treatment, it's basically outdoors in Wellington at 200M elevation above sea level and gets zero direct sunlight over the winter months.. I would say it must be a Hass avocado as it has survived some very cold storms including that infamous snow where it was down to -7C here. Done plenty of other well planned fish and garden experiments that failed, kinda cool :bggrn: that this one is defying what should not work and is now the largest plant in my aquaponics. Keeping it going just for kicks. Will get some decent pictures of current setup next few days and share..