do fish swim in round tanks

[tiny1oz]

Hi all, i am new and not sure if this is the right place to ask. I have two questions if i may please .
In the last two days i have read nearly all the forum but am unable to find some answers. I guess as always it is up to the experienced ones.:D
When using a round fish holding container, is there any type of individual type of fish ( given the right environment ) that swims around the barrel constantly, like a goldfish in a glass round fish bowl.( i guess from my reading sleepy cod are out ;)).
Secondly, is there anyone that has tried to grow sugar beet, in a flood and drain setup.Would they mind telling me what they found was the best media please and where they got their seeds from. I have read gravel is not so good, the perlites/vermiculites and coco have issues with water retention and timing. Does this leave expanded clay etc . Any assistance would be most helpful. Thanking you in advance. Tiny

[Murray]

Hi Tiny,
Silver Perch are on the move constantly. Murray Cod move around a bit but not as much as Silver and Jade perch do. As you have said Sleepy Cod do a lot of sleeping.
Barramundi move about constantly.
I am not sure where you would get Sugar Beet seeds, sorry.
Gravel would not be too good for growing a root crop such as sugar beet that is true.
Coco peat would be fine, but needs to be watered only once a day or even once every second day. Although, I did run a coco peat bed hooked into the regular watering cycle of my system which is about every 45 minutes. It worked fine as far as the plants were concerned, but the coco peat discoloured the water very badly.
Fish Food has some beds using a mixture of various mediums. Perhaps he can describe what he is doing in that regard.

I have not used expanded clay (except in some small pots) so I cannot comment.

[tiny1oz]

Hi murray,
thankyou for your reply.
i would like to offer that i have found your forum to be fantastic, information packed and i have learnt a lot in the last few days of solid reading.
i am about to start with a goldfish, fishtank and a lettuce to learn but am already planning for the end of my apprenticship.
If i may ask : Would you say that the constant movement of silver perch is erratic or circular ?
I ask as i am interested in not only the food values of fish and crops but also alternative energy systems as well and at this early stage for me for my long term design, i am exploring options for trying to capture energy as well to incorporate into my initial design. I have kept fresh water fish for many years and did some time with nft and tomatoes a while ago, have a grid solar power system and literally stumbled onto Aquaponics and your site boxing day.( great xmas present ).
I am exploring the possibility of fish movement to create energy inputs to assist with overall running of the system. ie: if given the right environment, fish swimming constantly around a round container make energy and can be translated into xyz eg: water wheel for lift/pumping, generator for other power , etc.
As for sugar beet, very high sucrose level and can be distilled for ethanol production to be used in motors.( but unfortunately at this stage dearer than pertol )
once again i thank you for your reply and information.most professional :o

[Martin A1]

Hi Tiny,
Interesting idea please keep us posted and share the love. I find it hard to believe that the fish will create enough circular motion to drive anything. Keep in mind that they are streamlined shapes to reduce resistance. I still have little experience with a Silver Perch population as I only have 1 left out of my first 100 :o. It is in a rectangular tank. My limited observation is that it moves in many directions as it chooses. My goldfish do the same. They also have the ability to stop still at will.

I have another 100 Silvers coming in mid Jan and a 1500 ltr circular gal tank about to start cycling so I will let you know what I observe down the track.

My only other idea would be to use the water return from the grow beds and set it up in such a way that it generates a circular motion. I have witnessed this in my original set-up although I had a pump returning the water. I reckon this would be more effective. Using gravity as the return flow is free energy but may not be as powerful.

Like I said I have a circular tank and would love to hear your progress on these ideas for my own understanding and application.

[tiny1oz]

hi martin
Great idea, gravity fed return swirling the water. I like it. I know their is minimal energy in these ideas but every little bit counts and even thou i have a solar generator i still dont make enouth to run my home and hate paying for electricity and using coal to furnace it and the planet. When i was in New Zealand earlier this year i saw trout in a farm and watched them for approx 1 hour and all they did was swim around and they did stir up movement alot. This is where i thought of the idea. Not enough to complete the energy picture but certainly some to assist, like sugar beets for ethanol production for generators.
ps i like what you have done with your system so far from the pictures in your thread, well done:D

[Martin A1]

Hi Tiny,

I have also recently added aerators to my system and noticed that they gently move the water around the tank. I know they take power to run but maybe you could set something up to have the air bubbles move in such a way that it generates a swirl too?

Just another idea for you to throw into the pot.

[tiny1oz]

hi martin
thanks for that, it all adds to the mix. I am still a long way from getting my project off the ground. I have started collecting the bits and pieces but am still a while of actually beginning. It is funny the ideas that pop up. I thought if i have to pump water from a low container to a higher container so gravity would flow through the system, then the highest container could work a bellows system ie: the weight of the water pumped into the container and then drained to the food container, blowing air into a elastic container ie: like an exercise/pilates ball/ balloon thingy would then release air at a constant into the fish pond, As i said , it is strange the ideas ones mind dreams up and as you can see i am still in dream phase.
Thanks again for you idea and i hope your system is going from strength to strength

[Crusty]

Bit late but anyways.

Perhaps what you are looking for is called a Ram Pump (no power) and can be made out of bits and pieces. I will suggest you need positive displacement into the culture tank (which will create your circular motion), not gravity return. Waste is best moved by gravity out of the culture tank to what ever filtration and pumped back into the culture tank. The other way around is not a good idea.

[jack@badflas]

My tilapia mentor built a huge D-end tilapia grow-out system that was powered by air-lift pumps. It was so intensive that pure oxygen was required.
You can read about it here:
http://www.cherrysnapper.com/Consultation/0.html

[Crusty]

My tilapia mentor built a huge D-end tilapia grow-out system that was powered by air-lift pumps. It was so intensive that pure oxygen was required.
You can read about it here:
http://www.cherrysnapper.com/Consultation/0.html

Cool looks like a copy of catfish and tilapia raceways only much smaller. Cool just the same. Pumping o2 could be an issue for a low value item like tilapia though. Are they for aquarium and how is it aquaponic?

[jack@badflas]

It wasn't aquaponic. Strickly raising food fish. Pure oxygen was made onsite with a small oxygen plant. These are not terribly cost intensive for a system of that size.

[SunCoaster]

Great idea, gravity fed return swirling the water.

Love the idea of reusing energy. What about a water wheel that is powered by the gravity fed water as it re enters the fish tank. Connected to an old bicycle light generator we had as kids could even power test equipment like a pH meter or maybe one of those electro-thingamy-doogees that propose to clean water by magnetising something at the right frequency.

Also, I imagine it would "stir" the water up more hitting the wheel and then falling intot the tank, thus increase oxegenation.

Thus cleaning the tank and reoxygenating no extra energy required.

[creddy]

Odd post to hop in for the first time on, but a while back I read about a guy that was building bucket generators for powerless villages in Guatamela.

I think if you are using a bell siphon to empty your grow bins, you might get enough to charge a battery and although probably not eliminate a need for a power source, at least diminish it.

http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2008/06/bucketborne_hydroelectric.html

Solar cells are all well and good, however they have to function for almost 2 years to create the power it took to make them in the first place, not to mention the leftover chemicals that are rarely disposed of properly.

[poohbear]

I ask as i am interested in not only the food values of fish and crops but also alternative energy systems as well and at this early stage for me for my long term design, i am exploring options for trying to capture energy as well to incorporate into my initial design. I have kept fresh water fish for many years

Hmm.. this sparked an interest in me. Just an idea. http://pro.corbis.com/images/DC005022.jpg?size=67&uid=%7BD018B65E-A0DA-403A-BCEA-8FAD370AF801%7D

But what if you used something like acitate or whatever those overhead projectors use for the clear papaer then attach it to say popcicle sticks and use a very very small generator to capture the energy. You'll probably need a lot of fish to make a small low power wheel turner. Dunno... probably get 5W a day or something but who knows and anything is better then nothing. Store power in a battery. NoteI've never done this but your post got me thinking some ideas. I've got lots of ideas but not many tools to work with so if someone can see something in the idea and biuld it , it would be cool to see in motion.

[fuzvulf]

Keep on coming up with ideas, just keep in mind that some inventors go through thousands of ideas before they hit on the real winner. A couple of things which might help.
Any time energy changes forms there are losses.
Energy is neither created nor destroyed.
What appears to be "free" may actually be putting additional load on another part of the system that cancels out any gain.
(like lifting water with a pump takes energy, so to lift it higher puts extra load on the pump wearing it out quicker, using more electricity, or getting fish to swim in circles may burn up food energy which might otherwise turn into fish flesh.)

Just a thought

[LPMurphy]

Any time energy changes forms there are losses.
Energy is neither created nor destroyed.
What appears to be "free" may actually be putting additional load on another part of the system that cancels out any gain.
(like lifting water with a pump takes energy, so to lift it higher puts extra load on the pump wearing it out quicker, using more electricity, or getting fish to swim in circles may burn up food energy which might otherwise turn into fish flesh.)

Quite true Fuzvulf - perhaps best to work at this from the angle of recapturing some of the energy being lost already and focusing where we pull from to not take from the fish flesh. What I mean is - if the system as a whole is going to move the water anyway - how can we use that movement to recapture at least some energy without causing more to be expended.