SentencedToBurn's crayfish aquaponics

PaulS · Apr 1, 2015

SentencedToBurn said:
Thanks Paul

Yup I gotta feed the crayfish every two days, the good thing is that they eat tons of things - there is a good article on keeping these exact species and you can feed them vegie cutoffs, bits of fish, meat, etc. theyll eat anything. I have just chopped up some carrot and dropped it in the tank and man they're all over it.

I wouldn't of thought they eat all those things thats interesting.
BTW were you following the world cup at all? I was gutted nz didn't win, stupid australia!

Rairdog · Apr 1, 2015

Try a 45 deg elbow under GB to burb the bell from below instead of a 90. The horizontal line will trap air sometimes.

Yabbies look cool. I gave up on them . They are escape artists. They will climb any pipe or cord hanging over the side. I have my tanks completely cover and they would squeeze through pushing the top up. Found one in my sandals when I put them on about 3 months after he escaped. It was a smelly crunchy treat!

Sawyer · Apr 1, 2015

Looking very good. I look forward to seeing how all this turns out.

SentencedToBurn said:
Finally got my crayfish today: 3 NZ native koura (obtained legally from http://www.clearwatercrayfish.co.nz/). Pretty stoked, everything is now up and running, water levels are close to target, hopefully it'll stay that way.

You say "obtained legally"; is there a law in NZ against collecting them from the wild? Are you just trying to keep these three alive, or do hope they'll reproduce so you can sell to market? If you do sell, would it be for the hobbyist, fish bait, or food?

SentencedToBurn · Apr 1, 2015

PaulS said:
I wouldn't of thought they eat all those things thats interesting.
BTW were you following the world cup at all? I was gutted nz didn't win, stupid australia!

Hey Paul yeah nah I'm a minority group who doesn't follow Cricket at all, for me its all about Rugby Union - will be following RWC this year, nice that you guys are hosting it, are you going to any games at all?

Sawyer said:
Looking very good. I look forward to seeing how all this turns out.

You say "obtained legally"; is there a law in NZ against collecting them from the wild? Are you just trying to keep these three alive, or do hope they'll reproduce so you can sell to market? If you do sell, would it be for the hobbyist, fish bait, or food?

Thanks mate. There are laws here against taking/breeding any freshwater fish unless you have paperwork, etc, and it seemed like a real bureaucratic process. I couldnt get a clear answer whether you can just take koura from streams or whether you had to buy it - some people said it was fine, some said it wasnt, the online information is pretty vague so I just decided to play it safe and buy it directly from a koura farm. It was cheap enough - only $10 each plus shipping. So it saved me chasing it up, calling department of conservation, etc.

I think one of them is a female (all 3 are similar age, but one is significantly smaller), so if they do start to reproduce I'll have to think what I'm doing - while reading up on whether or not they're legal to keep I saw that there are restrictions as far as their sale goes. Either way I'm not keeping them for profit - they are just waste factories to help my plants at this stage.

If I manage to grow lots of them, then once they get to the right size they'll definitely be making an appearance on my dinner table. But that's probably another year or two away.

Rairdog said:
Try a 45 deg elbow under GB to burb the bell from below instead of a 90. The horizontal line will trap air sometimes.

Yabbies look cool. I gave up on them . They are escape artists. They will climb any pipe or cord hanging over the side. I have my tanks completely cover and they would squeeze through pushing the top up. Found one in my sandals when I put them on about 3 months after he escaped. It was a smelly crunchy treat!

Oh thanks mate - yeah at the moment the bells are working perfectly, its been about 2 weeks (I think) they havent had any issues stopping or starting. But will keep that in mind for sure.

At the moment they havent escaped (yet), but I do have a pipe and a cable going to the pump where they can potentially climb out, so I might have to sort that area out.

PaulS · Apr 2, 2015

SentencedToBurn said:
Hey Paul yeah nah I'm a minority group who doesn't follow Cricket at all, for me its all about Rugby Union - will be following RWC this year, nice that you guys are hosting it, are you going to any games at all?

Thanks mate. There are laws here against taking/breeding any freshwater fish unless you have paperwork, etc, and it seemed like a real bureaucratic process. I couldnt get a clear answer whether you can just take koura from streams or whether you had to buy it - some people said it was fine, some said it wasnt, the online information is pretty vague so I just decided to play it safe and buy it directly from a koura farm. It was cheap enough - only $10 each plus shipping. So it saved me chasing it up, calling department of conservation, etc..

I'm the opposite then! I love my cricket but I dont follow rugby, my dad is a big rugby fan. So I won't be going to any games, I go to all the england cricket matches at the ground closest to me so I'm seeing games against nz and australia this summer, we will prob lose both but nevermind!

It seems like there are a lot of things to consider when taking a couple of crayfish from the wild, I think I would of just bought them too!

SentencedToBurn · Apr 6, 2015

So far the greens are doing very well as expected, and also as expected the peppers aren't doing great which confirms the suggestion of a phosphate deficiency.

The two plants with white tags infront of them are peppers - the other ones are just lettuce/silverbeet, and there are two rock melon seedlings at the back edge by the trellis (the kids insisted we try, so why not).

Aquaponics Pink Tiger:

Soil Pink Tiger:

So far the soil plant is more than double the height and width. They were both of the same age and both had mites attack them. But the soil one seemed to have recovered much faster and is now well ahead.

Last week I followed advise of one of my mates and have gathered about a kg of sand from a stream, washed it thoroughly, boiled it to kill off whatever was there and added it to the tank - this is supposed to bring down pH slightly (I'm currently at 7.5 still but need to be at about 6.5), and also the sand is meant to raise Phosphorus levels a bit too. I saw a slight drop in pH - but cant tell whether phosphorus levels have changed.

Also after reading it seems that peppers might be one of the harder plants to grow in aquaponics and often you gotta wait for an entire season before getting any fruit. But we'll see how I get on.

SentencedToBurn · Apr 12, 2015

I have finally identified food that the crayfish love to eat - dogfood. I tried giving them a few small bits of the dog sausage I feed my dogs, they all came out of their hidy holes and grabbed a piece.

The river sand also helped drop pH to about 7.2-7.3, hopefully it'll drop to under 7 in the next few weeks otherwise I will need to get some pH lowering stuff from the pet shop.

And it seems that the phosphorus levels may have increased judging by the improved growth of that same pink tiger plant. I'm finally getting some new leaves. Still way behind the soil comparison plant but at least it's looking much healthier now.

Aquaponics Pink Tiger

Soil pink tiger:

Pinhigh · Apr 13, 2015

If your Aqua plants are anything like my hydro ones they seem to take a while to get the roots developed, but once they do the top growth takes off! Dog food thing is funny. Everything else looking good.

Noah Yates · Apr 13, 2015

Very cool!!!

SentencedToBurn · Apr 13, 2015

Pinhigh said:
If your Aqua plants are anything like my hydro ones they seem to take a while to get the roots developed, but once they do the top growth takes off! Dog food thing is funny. Everything else looking good.

Thanks mate yeah hopefully it was just while the roots were getting established. I popped the rest of the pepper plants in there - and they seemed to have stopped growing for a while, I'll see what happens in a few weeks - hopefully once their roots are sorted they'll start growing again.

Noah Yates said:
Very cool!!!

Thanks mate, hoping it'll look even better in a few month's time once the peppers have taken off.

Trident chilli · Apr 13, 2015

Yabbies are they affected by a change in PH and the fluids that are introduced to change PH ... great to see difference in size of your two Pink Tigers ... aquaponics versus soil ... glued to your glog ... very inspirational only know of one hobbyist doing this in the UK on the Chilli Forum

SentencedToBurn · Apr 13, 2015

Trident chilli said:
Yabbies are they affected by a change in PH and the fluids that are introduced to change PH ... great to see difference in size of your two Pink Tigers ... aquaponics versus soil ... glued to your glog ... very inspirational only know of one hobbyist doing this in the UK on the Chilli Forum

Hey thanks - according to the guy who breeds Koura here in NZ, he said that these species don't seem to be affected by pH changes as much, not sure about the fluids that are introduced to change pH though.

Im hoping the aquaponics plant will eventually catch up - i do have the soil plant in about 30-35 liters worth of soil so hoping that'll be enough to bring it close to it's full potential. Although I got pretty big plants growing them in 9L buckets too.

One thing I found is that aquaponics forces you to be organic - you can't use fertilisers, or even use copper sprays as it pretty much kills the crayfish. I've never been one to advocate organic - I'll use if it it works, but if I need to kill mites or other pests then I'll use whatever method is more effective. But now I have a lot of restrictions on what I can do. But its all good - part of learning.

Elvis Has Left The Forum · Apr 13, 2015

Things are looking great, Anthony!!! The dog food is good info... With all the things the crayfish will eat, it sounds like they will be easy to feed... All of your plants are looking good, but I hope the aquaponic pink tiger can catch up!!! I am glad the bell siphons are still going strong... Your doing great work!!! I love this Glog... Keep it coming!!!

Ozzy2001 · Apr 13, 2015

My kids found this guy in our creek after the last big rain we had. Made me think of your glog. It's looking good!

This picture doesn't do it justice. This is in a 6 pack cooler.

SentencedToBurn · Apr 13, 2015

Ozzy2001 said:
My kids found this guy in our creek after the last big rain we had. Made me think of your glog. It's looking good!

image.jpg
This picture doesn't do it justice. This is in a 6 pack cooler.

Awesome - yeah you one looks a bit different to mine, I guess heaps of different species out there.

I also realised one of mine might be a Red Glory Kaura - which is a selective breed from the regular New Zealand native Koura, they are red in colour (even before they are cooked). Here is a pic of the one that started changing colour in the last few days:

FL Born said:
Things are looking great, Anthony!!! The dog food is good info... With all the things the crayfish will eat, it sounds like they will be easy to feed... All of your plants are looking good, but I hope the aquaponic pink tiger can catch up!!! I am glad the bell siphons are still going strong... Your doing great work!!! I love this Glog... Keep it coming!!!

Thanks Bill yeah your advise with the bell siphons really helped, and I'm hoping that as the system matures the plants will adjust and will grow as well as soil ones (or even better?).

SentencedToBurn · Apr 18, 2015

The difference between soil and aquaponics plants is even greater now. I think this experiment should be called Soil vs New Aquaponics since it does look like mature aquaponics setups perform very differently compare to new ones.

My water measurements to date (grey line on 4th of April is when I added rocks/sand from a stream to help increase phosphorus and drop pH):

Pink Tiger - the difference is pretty definitive:

White Naga: although the plants are still young you can already see the difference in size. The yellow colour isnt as bad, I think it was due to the lighting on that side of the greenhouse.

Elvis Has Left The Forum · Apr 19, 2015

Wow, Anthony!!!! As always a great post and thread!!!
Your crayfish look like they are doing great...
You have been very diligent in your testing and data logging... :clap:

I am curious what your ammonia levels look like in the crayfish tank...
Also, have you supplemented the soil plant with any nutrients???

I also like your temperature logging system and hopefully will set something up like it...
I would like to use several of the usb sensors at different locations and log them all on the same chart...
Can the temperature logging and charting software monitor more than one temperature sensor at the same time???

Awesome work...
Have a great week, my friend!!!

Rairdog · Apr 19, 2015

Ozzy2001 said:
My kids found this guy in our creek after the last big rain we had. Made me think of your glog. It's looking good!

image.jpg
This picture doesn't do it justice. This is in a 6 pack cooler.

That is a Rusty Crayfish. Very very invasive and native to the Ohio valley. They were shipped to other states as soft craws for bait. They soon wiped out the native populations of crayfish in MN, WI, and MI.

Most craws are omnivorous. Some are more on the herbivorous side. The aquaponic plants rely on the fish/craw food you put in. They will always produce nitrates/nitrogen from waste. A good quality food will have (P)phosphate, some (K)potassium and trace mircos. Most AP'ers will substitute with Kelp using maxicrop or seasol. It has the extra K needed, micros and some is fortified with Iron which also is lacking in fish feed.

For pest control you can use Neem oil sprayed on the foliage. The oil is bad for the fish/crays so avoid letting it drip into the beds. It is best if you are pro-active and spray with neem before the aphids show up. Another option is to spray them off with a jet of water. The aphids will usually be farmed and brought to the plants by ants. Trace them down and put Terro traps and/or Boric acid. Some will even put the legs that support the beds in a tub or water or grease to stop the ants from bringing in the aphids. A GH and AP system is a prime target for aphids. The ants bring them up 10 ft to my deck system.

SentencedToBurn · Apr 19, 2015

FL Born said:
Wow, Anthony!!!! As always a great post and thread!!!
Your crayfish look like they are doing great...
You have been very diligent in your testing and data logging...
I am curious what your ammonia levels look like in the crayfish tank...
Also, have you supplemented the soil plant with any nutrients???

I also like your temperature logging system and hopefully will set something up like it...
I would like to use several of the usb sensors at different locations and log them all on the same chart...
Can the temperature logging and charting software monitor more than one temperature sensor at the same time???

Awesome work...
Have a great week, my friend!!!

Hey Bill yeah I'm pretty stoked with the progress, although the Aquaponic plants arent doing too well but its all in learning. I havent tested ammonia in the last couple of weeks - I think I'll do that this week and will start logging it on a weekly basis as I do with the rest of the parameters.

I did feed my plants with some 7-4-10 that I've been using for a while (http://sog.shopau.biz/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=55&products_id=1445&osCsid=7b2e09d2e548adbac3f2746ebefdb063) it seems to work very well. Although last few weeks I've switched to just water, one of my plants looked as it had a bit too much nutes so I stopped feeding them for a while.

The temperature logger that I'm using only supports one input so you might want to look at some other options. I'm sure there will be a better option out there, especially places like aliexpress have all sorts of things.

Rairdog said:
That is a Rusty Crayfish. Very very invasive and native to the Ohio valley. They were shipped to other states as soft craws for bait. They soon wiped out the native populations of crayfish in MN, WI, and MI.

Most craws are omnivorous. Some are more on the herbivorous side. The aquaponic plants rely on the fish/craw food you put in. They will always produce nitrates/nitrogen from waste. A good quality food will have (P)phosphate, some (K)potassium and trace mircos. Most AP'ers will substitute with Kelp using maxicrop or seasol. It has the extra K needed, micros and some is fortified with Iron which also is lacking in fish feed.

For pest control you can use Neem oil sprayed on the foliage. The oil is bad for the fish/crays so avoid letting it drip into the beds. It is best if you are pro-active and spray with neem before the aphids show up. Another option is to spray them off with a jet of water. The aphids will usually be farmed and brought to the plants by ants. Trace them down and put Terro traps and/or Boric acid. Some will even put the legs that support the beds in a tub or water or grease to stop the ants from bringing in the aphids. A GH and AP system is a prime target for aphids. The ants bring them up 10 ft to my deck system.

Hey thanks Rairdog I'll see if I can source the food you suggested. And yeah I have learnt my lesson with ants over the last few years, now I set ant traps proactively even if they arent around. I havent used neem oil but I've heard a lot of people using it - will definitely do it carefully not to drip it onto the growbeds.

Trippa · Apr 20, 2015

Kaura love calf/lamb/sheep/beef liver bro ... As a youngster eeling in creeks the liver would always bring them out of woodwork ...lots of nutrition in it as well