Gordon's 2nd, larger, AP system

rininger85

Gunagulla wrote:

is that expansion #3,4,5, and 6 in the background?

dstjohn99

I think I'm lucky that I don't have that much space. I already spend most of my time and much money upgrading the systems I have. With that kind of space I would be building greenhouses, PV systems, lighting, rocket stoves, etc. I'd need tractors, a dump truck, maybe a helicopter....

Gunagulla

rininger85 wrote:

is that expansion #3,4,5, and 6 in the background?

haha no, just a cut up old water tank for storing fire wood.

Capacity for >400 trout per year is more than enough for me, and I don't really want to buy another freezer to store them all in, not to mention the big upgrade in my off-grid power system that would be needed to expand the AP significantly - mainly for water cooling.

rininger85

I just figured they might be grow beds... 400 trout could feed a lot of grow beds! what size tank are you using to grow out 400 trout?

Gunagulla

The FT is 9500 litres. viewtopic.php?f=18&t=24153#p495243

Lately with the water getting up around 19C, a lot of them are swimming against the main current near the surface - facing radially inwards, mostly at a speed to maintain their position. 2 X 60lpm pumps through 3 air discs sets up quite a decent radial flow outwards across the surface.

Gunagulla

Our fig tree is producing lots of fruit ATM, so we decided to have trout with fig and balsamic vinegar (and olive oil) sauce on it. Since the freezer is now empty of trout, I went out and netted one, a fish called dinner

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At 670 grams and 37cm long, it's fairly typical of what's in the tank ATM, although there are a few much larger trout in there.

One point of interest I forgot to mention about the 37 trout I harvested on the 11th, was that they were all male fish.

boss

You always create a lot of envy for us,

Nhibbo

"a fish called dinner".

What an excellent name for a fish.
Looking forward to being able to name a few of my own.....they are slowly getting there (SP"s).

Gunagulla

In last nights storm the tall bag growing spuds in one of the AP WBs finally gave way and fell over, so today I harvested the spuds.

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Just over 2kg of them from one bag, which I'm happy with.

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I'll harvest the other bags soon, but since 2 of them were only ever on the ground, I dont expect as many spuds, and the one that I moved into the WB after a few weeks may have a few more... I'll find out soon.

Gunagulla

Lots of chiller run time is keeping the water at a decent temperature for the trout, and mostly below the minimum air temp each morning. I generally start it up before sunrise, to make the most of the better COP then.

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I transferred a few hundred litres of water from the filters into the small AP system this arvo, as nutrients are in short supply down there lately, with only 5 trout and 1 MC. Hopefully there are sufficient bacteria to deal with the surge in fish poo!

Gunagulla

The chiller sure is getting a workout in this unpleasantly hot weather, and I've managed to keep the water below 20C so far, generally starting the chiller up and hour or so before sunrise. It's using up to ~30kWh per day ATM, so the inverter is getting a pretty hard workout and getting rather hotter than I'd like. I need to install more fans to cool it, but blowing 40C air over it doesn't offer a huge amount of cooling.

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Not much happening in this system other than lots of rhubarb and some asparagus now the berries have pretty much finished. The boysenberry vine has gone berserk and spread all over a number of other GBs, but I'm leaving it in place with just a bit of pruning every now and then, as it shades the GBs well. It is also using up most of the nitrates. The huge amount of parsley has mostly gone to seed.
The finger limes in the WB part of this system have lots of fruit, not quite ripe yet.

boss

Wow yes it's a bit out there. Looks like the chiller works well though.

Gunagulla

I lost quite a few trout after the water got near 20C for a few days earlier this month, which was rather disappointing. I had 120lpm of air going in the whole time, and NH3 and NO2 were only around 0.25ppm when checked after I found the first dead one, with pH in the high 6s. Nearly a week of grabbing floating dead fish, but I froze most of them ungutted for dog food. I also caught quite a lot of live ones, which are now in the freezers after processing, leaving ~250 in the FT.

The largest dead one was 1.64kg.

I ran the chiller for very long hours each day in the continuing hot weather to bring the water temp down a bit after the deaths, and there have been no more deaths for nearly 2 weeks.

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Lately I've been feeding the fish a few organic dog food pellets mixed in with the usual 6mm Ridley's pellets. They are about 12mm diameter, so only taken by the larger trout, but they seem just as keen on them as their usual food.

scotty435

Hi Gordon. The protein content of the dry dog food would probably be lower. Is this for cost savings or just not expecting as much growth with them at this stage? Cheers.

Gunagulla

Yes Scotty, the protein content is lower- the dog food is 20% protein, and the pellets are I think 43%. It is more of an experiment to see if they will eat them and if they will float - and perhaps slow down the growth of the larger fish a bit. There isn't much of a difference in cost per kg of the food, other than I pay a lot more in freight on the fish pellets.

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