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These are some drawings of my first attempt at raising fish in my backyard.
The idea for this came
from a book called "The Radale Aquaculter Projects Home
Aquaculture A guide to Backyard Fish Farming
by Stwven D. Van Gorder
Douglas J. Strange
The drawings were made
with the Microsoft Paint program that comes with Windows.
There were resized and converted to JPG's with a free program
called QV.exe.
You can get QV.exe at CYLWeb
it is one of my favorites.
This is a 12 foot diameter 3 foot deep vinyl-lind swimming pool. It holds 2,000 gallons of water when filled to 10 inches from the top.
The three Plastic drums are the filter to remove solids wast from the water befor it can settle to the bottom.
A 2 inch siphon moves the water from the swimming pool to the first drum which is fillrd with bird netting to slow down the flow so that the solids will settle out. A 2 inch siphon moves the water from first drum to the second drum. The Second drum has a filter made from fiber cooler padding. A 2 inch siphon moves the water from the second drum to the third drum. The water from the third drum was returned to the swimming pool with two 5 gallon/minute pumps. The flow from the pumps were used to turn the water wheel in the center of a Rotating Biofilter.
The Rotating Bio filter
The water wheel in the was made by cutting two 36 inch dimeter wheel sides from a 4 X 8 foot plastic sheet. The 48 bucket walls were made of 3/4 inch red wood 4 1/2 long and 3 7/8 inches wide with a 3/4 X 3/4 inch 3 7/8 long glued and nailed 1 inch from one end. the bottom was placed 30 degrees off center and the top was placed 7 1/2 inch off center. They were sealed with Sliicone rubber sealant.
The Filter part was made fo 50 24 inch diameter
filter plates cut from corrugated fiberglass roofing and 4 24
inch diametre 2 inch thick styrene fome flotes. Four 9/16 inch
dimater alognment holes were drilled in the water wheel and
filter plates at an 11 inch rarius at 45 degrees so that each
plate dould be turned 45 degrees from the previous one. Then a 4
1/2 inch center hole was cut for the axle. One fome flote was put
next to the water whell on either side then 25 filter plates were
placed each one turned 1/4 trun aftre the 25 filter plates were
placed on each side a second 2 inch fome flote was placed on the
end. Place a commode floor flang with an 1/8 inch segment cout
out so it can be clamped in place with an 18 inch whose clamp
about 4 inches in from the end of a 4 inch plastic pipe. Push the
pipe through the center hole and slide another flanfe over it on
the other side and clamp it to hold the filter together. Slide
(don't glue) a 4 X 2 inch reducer onto each end of the axle.
Slide (don't glue) a 2 inch piece of plastic pipe into the ens of
each reducer.
The frame
There are 4 caps inside to keep water out of the main part of the frame. The 1 1/2 inch axle is not glued, it is held in place by two screws.
These Bio filters are costly to build and are only good for about 200 fish. So if you want to grow 400 fish you need two for 600 fish ypu need 3 ans so on. Rember that each one requires two 5 gallon/minute pumps to make them work.
You would be better off making 3 or 4 4' X 8' X 12" grow beds filles with pea gravle and growing plants.
A better system
A better system would be one that uses three grow beds as a Bio filter and three half drums to colect the return water from the beds and flote switches and ponps to return the water to the pool.
The three Plastic drums are the filter to remove solids wast from the water befor it can settle to the bottom.
A 2 inch siphon moves the water from the swimming pool to the first drum which is fillrd with bird netting to slow down the flow so that the solids will settle out. A 2 inch siphon moves the water from first drum to the second drum. The Second drum has a filter made from fiber cooler padding. A 2 inch siphon moves the water from the second drum to the third drum. The water from the third drum is pumped to the grow beds which drain into the half drums with pumps and float switches to return the water to the swimming pool.
A 900 gal./hr pump and a fountain head is in the center of the swimming pool as an aerator.
These systems can be used to grow cold water fish year round. To grow worm water fish Like Tilapia the water temp. should be above 60 degrees in most parts of the US you can stock in May and harvest in Oct. You can extent the growing period by either putting a plastic dome over the swimming pool or putting the system in a greenhouse.
Like the Backyard Greenhouse that can be found HERE
By adding 3 or 4 grow beds and the 900 gal./hr pump and fountain head aerator to the system instead of the Rotating Bio filter you should be able to grow 1,000 fish in this system.