UrbanAquaponics.com Welcomes You!

[nwestwood]

Let me be the first to welcome all of you to our new online aquaponics community. Urban Aquaponics is designed to give us aquaponics enthusiasts a place to share our systems, ideas and experiences. It is the first full featured community of it's kind complete with personal blogs, forums, article publication, community groups, and much much more. What you see today is only the beginning and your suggestions and input can directly impact future directions.

Now a little about me.

I am entrepreneur who has operated a number of businesses, including a multi-million dollar farming operation, a software development company, and am currently a partner in Alpine Business Brokers, a Utah business brokerage. I enjoy teaching and have taught as an adjunct professor at the college level. In 1989 I and my wife were named Utah’s Young Farmer and Rancher of the Year and were runners up for the National award. I am also active in Boy Scouts and have received my Silver Beaver award. I have a background in business management, farm management, software development and love to try new ventures. My personal venture in aquaponics started more than 10 years ago, then after a 10 year hiatus was reborn in 2008. You can see more about my system at www.utahaquaponics.com and I'll shortly have much of that site posted on my personal Blog on this site.

There are many fine forums for aquaponics, especially for those enthusiasts in Australia, until now there were no Aquaponic Communities. At present, I have no products to sell and no special agenda to promote, my interest is in seeing the community grow. Any advertising on this site is for the purpose of offsetting the costs of development and hosting and to continue to grow the industry.

I wish you all the best in your Aquaponic and other endeavors.

Neal Westwood
UrbanAquaponics.com

Another Ongoing Project

[GoneFish'n]

The site looks great Neal. It is an honor to become one of the first members.

A little about me: I am not much of an entrepreneur, although I have tried to stick my foot in many doors. Mostly selling products or services, but I am just not much of a salesman. I have had many vocations over the years. Surveyor, Offset Lithographer, Electronic Technician, Computer Technician, Dental Technician, Linguist, Special Agent, and Investigator. I was raised on a small farm, most of the time is was dry land, and I have always had a garden whenever possible. I just recently, this past year, got interested in Aquaponics and Hydroponics. For the moment I have a small hydroponic system setup in my basement, but I want to expand into Aquaponics as well.

I am looking forward to participating in this community with others of like mind and interests.

Lynn Bybee

[ElfNori]

Wow! A new place to talk about neat stuff! Very cool!

Neal, are you going to include plant walls and vertical gardens?

[nwestwood]

Done, I added a section in the forums for Other Growing Systems - wether they are connected to the fish tanks or not.

[tpate]

Always interested in hearing about aquaponics ideas. I do aquaponics as hobby and no commercial activities planned. I have some indoor (1000 gal) fish tanks and NFT attached right now with some cool weather plants growing. I had a small outdoor system last spring that produced good results and plans are to have larger outdoor flow through system set up for spring . I have no agenda or posts about aquaponic system to post yet, maybe later on. I'm willing to share my limited knowledge freely.

Tom Pate

[Bwind]

This forum looks like a great place Neal. I got the gardening bug not long after I lost the use of one of my knees and was bored with life. I was given a little seedling kit and told by the family to stop grumbling. Just watching the little strawberries grow and bloom got me well hooked. I found about Aquaponics about 2 years ago. I would like nothing more than to find a nice, "useless" plot of land and grow an aquaponic farm and live my life out that way. Until then I'll just grow a little barrelponic system and apprecialt what I have.

BTW, big thanks to Travis Huey for donating his plans and ideas to the world on Barrelponics. I'm not affiliated with Travis, just appreciative.

Brad
ps. In case you wondered, my knee was replaced a year ago and I'm much better.

[nwestwood]

Welcome,Tom, Brad, ElfNori and the others. It's your input that will make this site successful. Anyone who is willing, write an article on how you got started, or on a subject you've had opportunity to dig into and we will share it with the rest.

And yes, the BarrelPonics group over in the Yahoo groups is a great resource, especially for smaller systems where a 55 gallon fish tank is enough. He distributes his manual for free and there are lots of good ideas. I'll post a section with links to other sites so we can all benefit from resources out there.

As you may have noticed, he doesn't like us to post announcements about new sites there, but when you see a question in the group, that is answered in one of our forums, articles or Blogs, you can answer the question and include a link back to the article. That will draw people over here to contribute, without causing Travis concern.

[murray]

Hi nwestwood, great to see you have started up a US forum. I am sure it be a good resource to deal with the many unique US Aquaponic problems like the extreme cold in parts of the US.
The more people that are talking about and engaging in aquaponics the better.
I believe it is the way of the future for home and commercial food production in limited space. It can be successful anywhere. An excellent example in your country is Growing Power.

[nwestwood]

Thanks for the kind words Murray. We hope to spread Aquaponics bug far and wide here in the US. Now we just need a good supplier for the hobby market.

[KentUB]

I grew up on a small ranch in the gold country of California and you could say raising crops and animals is in my blood as I come from a long line of ranchers and farmers.

My background is firmly rooted in technology. As an Electronics Engineer, Computer Systems Analyst, Systems Programmer, Computer Science Teacher, Web Programmer, etc. I have also owned several small businesses and operated as an independent contractor as well. About 5 years ago I began changing the focus of my life, becoming a Certified Hypnotherapist and moving to a small farm in almost the middle of no where (the middle of no where is ½ mile up the road)

Almost 2 years ago we moved to our home in the mountains in Mountain Home, UT. Being at 7000 ft USDA Zone 5 is a huge challenge we are working hard to overcome it. We are almost guaranteed to have frost on Memorial Day and Labor Day! Our attempt at an outdoor garden last year resulted in 4 tomatoes and a dozen squash before the frost wiped it out. This year’s garden will be in a high tunnel as well as having the Greenhouse that will hold the Aquaponics system.

Our first greenhouse will be an 800 sq ft to workout the designs and systems we are wanting to utilize. Our goal is to go commercial on a smaller scale than the mega systems, selling direct to consumers, restaurants and independent stores. Our goal is self sufficiency and independence as much as is possible.

I have been thinking of getting into the field of supplying the hobby market here in the US. The very few suppliers that are out there have a market lock right now and can charge the extreme prices they do since they have no competition. One of the best examples is probably Farm-in-a-Box. Although building a small system like those for a hobby is not expensive, most examples involve saw horses, plastic tubs, etc. Most US consumers are going to want something in their house that is much better looking than what you see on YouTube. So I see that is an area of huge opportunity for someone.

I have a real passion for teaching people to do for themselves and is one reason I welcome Neal’s efforts to get this site up and going. I see it as a real opportunity to spread the knowledge further into the US markets.

[nwestwood]

We have very similar backgrounds, I'll look for your help here. And I thought it was cold down here in the valley at 5,000 feet, we at least get a tomatoe crop!

[mpmace]

I don't have nearly the level of computer knowledge or farming know-how that others have. I do have, however, a love for living things and an insatiable desire to learn. I'm hoping to learn the basics of aquaponics before we move out to Beryl, Utah. The problems I'm going to have out there are going to be hard to overcome. I've decided to go with Koi because of the extreme heat we have here in the summer. I also can't afford the Utah registration fees at present. I too would like to branch out to a small commercial enterprise just to make sustainable living a reality. I look forward to working with everyone on this forum.

Paul Mace

[nwestwood]

Welcome Paul,

If do decide to get the registration, the Hybrid Stripped Bass do well in the heat. But Koi are a good choice to get started, some of us get way to excited about raising a lot of fish (especially me), and forget that they are the engine for the plants and the plants are the primary crop. Getting started with Koi will let you learn all the ropes and grow great veggies, without the regulation.

Again Welcome, we look forward to sharing your experiences. If you get up north, give us a call and lets get together.