Episode-510- Building Renewalable Protein Sources via Aquaponics
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Well after 500+ episodes it is rare that I can do a show fully dedicated to a subject I have never covered before but today is such a day. While I have mentioned aquaponics in passing on a few shows I have never delved deep into the subject as a stand alone before. There is a reason and I ask for your understanding today, unlike most things I discuss on The Survival Podcast I have little real world experience with aquaponics. What I bring to you today is from about a year of study on the subject and the observation of several functioning systems of various sizes.
Join me today as we discuss…
- What is aquaculture
- What is hydroponics
- What is aquaponics
- What is a grow bed
- What is a grow bed to tank ratio
- What can you use as grow bed medium
- How a basic system functions
- Sizes of Systems
- Micro – 10-75 Gallons
- Small – up to about 150 Gallons
- Medium – up to about 800 Gallons
- Large – over 800 Gallons
- Choosing fish
- Rapid growth
- Good eating
- Easy to prepare
- Take to commercial feed easily
- Easy to resupply
- Easy to breed
- Tilapia may be the perfect fish for aquaponics
- Breeding Hybrid Tilapia (mostly to all male)
- Vegan fish present the potential for a closed loop system
- Why I think you need a green house/screened area to do this right
- Cleaning the catch
- Preserving and cooking the meat
- Making use of waste
- Considering small scale commercial/barter options with surpluses
Resources for today’s show…
- Members Support Brigade
- Join Our Forum
- Common Sense Prep – (sponsor of the day)
- Western Botanicals – (sponsor of the day)
- Tank Culture of Tilapia
- Breeding Monosex Hybrid Tilapia
- Aquaponics the Synaptoman Way – (ebook by Keith Cutbert –MSB Members get this free in your members area)
- Aquaponics the Easy Way DVD – I highly recommend this resource, I no affiliation with them it is just one of the best I have seen so far
- The Best Aquaponics Forum I Have Found So Far – GREAT INFO, GOOD PEOPLE
- Video of a basic “barrelponics” system
- Video System of a Basic 300 Gallon System – Part One and Part Two – Really teaches the mechanics very well! NOTE the foil hattery at the end!
- Ron Hood’s Survival.com Magazine
Remember to comment, chime in and tell us your thoughts, this podcast is one man’s opinion, not a lecture or sermon. Also please enter our listener appreciation contest and help spread the word about our show. Also remember you can call in your questions and comments to 866-65-THINK and you might hear yourself on the air.
This is weird Jack…I started reading “Aquaponics The Synaptoman Way” last night…I finished it this morning and you came out with this podcast right after I finished. Maybe I’m supposed to do this? ha
Yay was hoping you would do a show on this. I’m looking for something like this to help feed my dogs actually 🙂 It’s goin’ in the vault for future reference…thanks Jack!
This was a great show. It got me motivated to start a small system on my back porch. The forum site you linked to is great. Thanks!
Thanks for the great show. I’m motivated now to put together a mini system. Hopefully I’ll get some good practice I can put towards a larger system in the future.
Jack, what size system are you planning to setup when you move? I don’t think you mentioned that in the show.
My uncle Denis had great success burying fish under his pepper plants before planting. The pepper plants did exceedingly well.
An idea for feed (based on something I heard Jack say a while back)
Take the screen’s out of the greenhouse in the evening and put them back in in the morning. Set up a bug zapper above the fish tank. (an incandescent bulb will work as well)
Bug goes zap. Falls in water. Yummy food for fish.
I would be afraid of what the Bugs would do to the plants though,
Would ALL bugs be attracted to the zapper? or are some immune to the lure of the zapper’s warm glowing, glowing warmness?
@Smajda,
Simplify, set up a bug zapper over a small dish outside, in the morning dump dish into tank, feed fish. No risk to the plants.
I’m thinking along the lines of Max. I’m a hobby dog breeder and feed my dogs a raw diet. I’ve been trying to think of ways that if I have to, I can produce enough meat & bones for them to survive. I had been thinking chickens, lots & lots of chickens! But now I can see a way to really help supplement a chicken diet with a very healthy addition. Also in high school, my bedroom was lined with fish tanks, so this has a real appeal to me! I’ll still be doing chickens, maybe rabbits, but I think there will be an aquaponics system in my future. Thanks for another outstanding podcast!
If you feed your dogs chickens, you may have trouble keeping them from eating the chickens you don’t want them to…