What I love about aquatic animals are the interactions between leaving creatures and their environment. As a kid I used to have fish in aquariums and loved to “recreate” a natural environment. It involved roots, rocks, plants, and gravels in fish tank. In aquaponics I would love doing the same thing but we have to keep few things in mind before adding gravels in fish tank.
The purpose of aquaponics
One of the main purposes of aquaponics is to produce food with the minimum maintenance possible. We also want to offer the best environment for the living creatures of our system especially the fish, bacteria and plants.
Adding gravels in the fish tank?
If we add gravels or sand on the bottom of the fish tank, the particles will fall and be trapped in the space between the substrate.
It is important to keep our fish tank clean (see video on how to keep the fish tank clean here: https://aquaponicsrevolution.com/improved-water-pump/ ). Dirty particles, if they build up on the bottom of the fish tank, can create anaerobic environment and fermentation.
For those reasons I recommend to not add substrate on the bottom of the fish tank.
A good alternative is to add a fish shelter (see video on fish shelter here: https://youtu.be/1ysLgGBqbas ). It will help the fish to feel good without allowing the organic matters to build up.
You will probably be interested to discover Jonathan’s six steps to build and manage an Aquaponics system. Click here to access for free! Thanks and good reading 🙂
