Interested to know about your aquaponics system output.....

[arthoz]

This the data of a commercial aquaculture of an earth pond:

http://bicarajutawan.com/forum/showt...p?t=563&page=5
Size: 2000 m sq (100m x 20m), Depth 5 feet. (Um...is it 1/2 an acre? Not sure of the conversion...)

Output (per pond):

Catfish--7 tonnes
Lobster--300-400 kg
Baung--1-2 tonnes
Tilapia--1-2 tonnes

He said that the survivability for fish in each pond is 50%...and he got about 17 ponds...

For brackish water: 8 ponds of 2 acres size.

each contain 5-6 tonnes of shrimps--if I translated it correctly...

If it's possible I'd like to know how your aquaponics system are doing compare to this person conventional method. I'd say he makes a good example since he's one of the successfull people in our local aquaculture industry...

I guess there must be someone who exceeds his output, since he only sells fish but doesn't produce any vegetables.....

[arthoz]

Let me start first...as an example.....

I have a system beside our driveway, about 12 feet x 5 feet (maybe around 4 meter x 1.5 meter) with a 150 gallon water tank. I got around 95 tilapias and several patin and carp (added later by my parents without my knowledge) with 36 pots of mixed vegetables (tomato, pegaga, salad, kailan, cabbage, chilies...).

He got 2000 m sq (100m x 20 m) pond with 1-2 tonnes of tilapia.

Say that mine grow to about 500g each so I'll have about 47.5 kg of tilapia harvest out of an area of 6 m sq. Multiply by 333 ( 6 sq m x 333 = 2000 sq m)
Correct me if I'm wrong, I'll have a maximum of 15817.5 kg or 15 tonnes of Tilapia.

But say that half of the area is needed for equipment and stuff--I'll still get more than 7 tonnes of tilapia...I'd say I did better than his earth pond.....

Since my system have only been working for 3 months so I can't say much about my vegetables yet...

Maybe I'm being to presumptious but feel free to advice (I know I need a lot of them considering my ignorance).....the folks here would really appreceate any information you could share including your plants harvest.....

[arthoz]

Another information is an output from Malaysian Fishery Department on rearing fish in net container in a river:

200 container with the size of 6 m x 6 m (maybe around 5 m deep since I can't see any aerator)...
Output estimated for all 200 container: 168000 kg (168 metric tonnes).
About 840 kg per container.

To be harvested after 6 month...

How do you compare your aquaponics system output with these two example of established aquaculture system?

[redleg]

Hi Arthoz
not easy to compare output compared to ponds or river cages.
aquaponics is brilliant output per unit of water used.
causes no pollution compared to river cage which is just dropping **** in the river , without paying for the downstream consequences.
pond culture is usually lower production for area used but low cost , .
there is enough aquaculture technology around to produce 100kg of fish per 1 tonne of water in tank culture but the cost often puts the producer broke.
production per square meter area in tank culture can be huge but that is not usually the limiting factor.
and aquaponics is fun !
cheers redleg

[arthoz]

Thank you...

We have a problem here at home where many people had started on the venture of rearing catfish in canvas container. It had a lot of publicity at first but a lot of them failed and I see it as a waste. There's a company nearby that seemed to go on well at the moment but they use a computerized system managing the water quality. Though I'm not qualified to say this, but I think it would have been easier and cheaper if you use the aquaponics system.

It will be a great relief if I'm able to convince them to modify their system...though I need to prove it to them with a working aquaponics system of my own. Wish me luck.....

The closest system that we have in practice are the fetergation but still, I see it as a needless waste of water no matter how much fresh source that we got.

[Dufflight]

I use less water that before now I grow mainly in AP. Thats not even counting the pool top up I would of normally made any way.

I've got 50+ catfish in my system and they have not skiped a beat since adding them. A very easy fish to keep. And cute as well.

[djs-sa]

Hi Duff did u get ur catfish from the hatchery at Narrabri, nice set up there me and hamish checked it out awhile ago

[Dufflight]

Yes. All my fish except george and a handfull of goldies came from there. They have an impressive setup there and always find time for a chat.