We Grow Dreams

I was up near Chicago not long ago and visited some one who has recently built an aquaponics system at We Grow Dreams.

we grow dreams aquaponics grow beds

Philip Wolf Designed an Aquaponics system that has a couple of big fish tanks dug into the ground and lined with EPDM liner. A pump lifts the water from the fish tanks to 12 inch deep gravel beds above the tanks. The gravel beds drain to a large raft bed and the raft bed drains back to the fish tanks.

we grow dreams rafts

The Aquaponics system is built in a heated greenhouse of the garden center at We Grow Dreams.

we grow dreams rafts close up

Now the system only has four 4′ by 8′ gravel beds and two 1000 gallon fish tanks. That is twice as much fish tank as gravel bed so if the system were heavily stocked, it might require some solids removal to keep it balanced long term but this should be a good opportunity to see how a hybrid gravel bed/raft system does in a real world situation.

If all else fails, I suppose the second fish tank could be counted as a sump tank and then it would be closer to a 1:1 fish tank to media bed system. (I definitely support having at least as much media bed as fish tank and my systems generally have twice as much media bed as Fish tank.)

I will say that on my Trip up to the South end of Lake Michigan, this Aquaponics system has the best design (other than needing about 4 more gravel beds of 4′ by 8′ by 12 inches deep) of the ones I toured. It is currently stocked with Perch and some Koi I think.