New fish

Well I have been sick for the last couple of days, but I made a lot of food with ginger and garlic and loaded up on vitamin C and feel better. Today my friend Jason, of North Texas Aquaponics, and I went and picked up some Tilapia. I bought 6 full size fish. On the drive home Jason and I discussed ways to heat the tanks. Jason has a very clever idea, and if your interested please comment and I will give you his info. Right now I have aquarium heaters in my systems, and the temps thus far have stayed above 65 degrees. I am starting to worry though that the falling temps here in DFW are going to possibly kill the fish. I have thrown around the idea of making a solar recirculating heating system, but have my doubts. I may just put one more aquarium heater in each system, but would love a way to lower energy use. I am open to any and all ideas. I look forward to hearing from you. I will have more photos and videos up soon.

Salt water bath

The last few days I have been reading through as much information as humanly possible on the subject of adding salt to an aquaponics system or giving your fresh water fish a salt bath.It is my understanding from the material I have read that the reason for the salt bath is to help sickly, or new fish within a system. The salt shocks the fish, but does not kill them, it does however kill parasites and certain fungi. This is kind of like a spa day for fish, when done they are placed back into their old tank, with rejuvenated gills, and hopefully no parasites. I like the idea of salt baths as a way to heal fish as it does not add salt to the system. From now on any new fish, or sick will get this treatment. What are some of your thoughts on salt baths? Any concerns, I would love to hear your comments.

 

The second form of salting I have researched involves adding salt directly to your system. Most everything I read said to add around 3 grams per liter. My first thought was great, now I have to convert everything to metric. Well that is ok, with all of the wonderful, free programs on the internet I can easily find one and convert away. I have also read that adding salt to the system is not bad for the plants, and is actually kind of good, in that it adds different forms of sodium for the plants. I like that. But I want first hand accounts of what people did, used and their outcome, did it work as planned? is this the best thing since canned beer? Let me know, I will continue the research and possibly salt my system this week.

Our Blue Barrel Indoor system.

We have completed and tested our 55 gallon Blue barrel indoor system, and everything works great. So like any sane person I took it apart and built another one. Here is a quick video of the system. I hope you like it.  Please ask any and all questions you may have. Have a great day. 

Being Self reliant

A major part of one’s wanting to grow Aquaponically Should also be a persons need to be more self reliant. I bring this issue up because their are to few people in today’s society that actually know how to do for themselves. Sure a lot of us can jump on our computers and create amazing videos, but when push comes to shove how many can truly fend for themselves and their families? I am not talking about going all John Rambo, what I am talking about is having a measure of self sufficiency that lends itself the ability to provide for one’s self and family. we are all so reliant on what we can buy at the super market or a Wallmart at all times of the night that many of us lack the basic skills needed to survive without some form of outside help if a situation occurs. If we take a snapshot of what is going on in the world today, we should all see the signs that it is not looking good for us. So what I propose is for you to ask me some how to questions in regards to some skills that you would like to have in bag if a event should arise. A great example of this is what happened during hurricane Katrina. Knowing the basics of water collection and purification will go a long way and could have in that situation. I am not saying you need to be prepared to spend months out in the Alaskan wilderness, but we all need to know the basics. So I will start, The first rule to know is the rule of three. The rule of three states that a human, on average, can go 3 minutes without air, 3 days without water, 3weeks without food, and 3 months without some form of socialization. Please feel free to ask any questions you may have, if I don’t have them I have plenty of like minded friends that will. Have a great evening, and happy growing.

New videos

I bought the rest of my parts today to finish my indoor unit. With this recent development I will start making how to videos and posting them here. I plan on also making some self reliance videos, and other videos related to aquaponics and self reliance. I have some friends and family members that are starting to or have been,living a self reliant lifestyle and with their help I plan on making videos of our progress. If there is a certain type of video you would like to see, just ask.  This video shows how easy it is to use Oasis grow cubes and Hydroton. 

The start of my indoor aquaponics system

Today I ran all kinds of errands to get the finishing touches for my indoor,garage, aquaponics system. I bought two aerator’s, one for each system, a few bags of Hydroton, and some air stones. The last thing I need is some 2 1/2″ pvc to finish my bell siphons. My fish and plants in the outdoor unit are doing great, as are my seedlings. I do need some insight into grow lights so if anyone is knowledgeable in them please let me know.

Hello world!

Hello happy aquaponics people,

This is the first day that Sage Aquaponics is out to help you with the in’s and out’s of living a self sufficient lifestyle. We hope that we can adequately answer any and all questions you may have in regards to aquaponics. We will try to review as much information as possible here. You can also visit us at our main page sageaquaponics.com or at our forum where many people can add their own ideas and creativity to your system.