Alternate meat sources after the rabbit

[snarlbuckle]

It seems like the combination of a fish farm and greenhouse would work well to match the flow of nutrients. Fish require oxygen and food, and they produce carbon dioxide and nitrogen. The closer you can get to an artificial ecosystem, the less material you have to put in and the less waste is produced. With that in mind, try to find specific organisms that work well together and capitalize on the flow of resources into and out of your ecosystem.

[eeyore]

Coming from someone who worked in the aquarium business for years, a 55 gallon barrel would be one of the worst place to raise fish. Barrels are tall in relation to the surface area of the top. The best combination for fish is relatively shallow but with tons of surface area. A 55 gal drum has 415 sq. inches of surface area. A typical 55 gallon aquarium has 624 sq inches of surface area. A small fish pond 10 inches deep, also holding 55 gallons would have 1250 sq inches of surface area. Now why should you care about surface area? Well that's where all the gas exchange happens, O2 in - CO2 out. More surface area = more fish. A great place to start would be a small garden pond, either molded plastic or made from a liner or a horse trough or similar. Leave the barrels for pickles.

What if the barrels are horizontal, cut in half and them on the laid on the side?

[pixel]

frogs for frog legs, crawfish for food, bees for honey, turtles for YUCK lol turtle soup,

[Godcopp]

Coming from someone who worked in the aquarium business for years, a 55 gallon barrel would be one of the worst place to raise fish. Barrels are tall in relation to the surface area of the top. The best combination for fish is relatively shallow but with tons of surface area. A 55 gal drum has 415 sq. inches of surface area. A typical 55 gallon aquarium has 624 sq inches of surface area. A small fish pond 10 inches deep, also holding 55 gallons would have 1250 sq inches of surface area. Now why should you care about surface area? Well that's where all the gas exchange happens, O2 in - CO2 out. More surface area = more fish. A great place to start would be a small garden pond, either molded plastic or made from a liner or a horse trough or similar. Leave the barrels for pickles.

[manowar]

protein comes in many sources, there are lots of plants in abundance that have lots of protein, look at Trifolium spp (clover) very easy to identify and high in protein.
but for those who love meat, me included(i just like haveing options) i have dehydrated alot of ground beef.
also i do not hunt my property prefering to hunt else where while helping the wild life flourish w/o any pressure. if there happens to be a horde of city folk, my hypothesis is that most will not survive the first year or two then i will hope(not having any prior experience in this area)that things would get back to "normal" what ever that may be
manowar

[becky3086]

Yes I have read about it too. I would love to have a system like that but I have trouble enough handling what I already have.

[Bearman202]

I have read a bit about 'aquaponics' and it looks really interesting. You set up your growing stations, fill it with gravel, and run water through it to a fish tank at the bottom of the process. You then plant in the growing stations, (in the gravel, not in dirt) and pump water from the fish tank up through it. The fish waste fertilizes the plants so they grow fine, and the water is filtered by the time it makes it back to the fish tank. Do a search on it.

As for raising quail, I had the same problem with the idea in that it would take three of them to make a meal. As for ducks. they might be okay, but a cousin raised geese and he said you had to retrain them every day....

[becky3086]

Exactly! lol,

[Tofu]

Oh and I meant to mention crawfish. I have read a few articles on raising them that seemed do-able for the normal homesteader.

emm pinch the tail, suck the head goodness...

[becky3086]

Oh and I meant to mention crawfish. I have read a few articles on raising them that seemed do-able for the normal homesteader.

[becky3086]

Hate to get off the fish subject but I think the quail are a great idea. I have raised some for several years now. You do need an incubator though (the styraphome ones work just fine) because they won't set on their own eggs in captivity. They are, however, mature in 8 weeks and start laying eggs then. The down side is you need 2 or 3 to make a meal for one person.
You may also try ducks (I have a dozen), geese, turkeys, pheasants (I have one of these. She lays great!), pidgeons, guinea (mine did not lay well enough) and I have heard of people raising guinea pigs for food.

[Tarakian]

I don't have any experience in this, but here is an ehow article (also NOT my article) http://www.ehow.com/how_4474959_rais...sh-barrel.html

They are saying 40 fingerling catfish to a barrel, seems like a lot to me.

[eeyore]

I had thought about those pools, but as cold as it gets in the Winter (in bad years) here would probably kill them.

[Spock]

Hope your barrels are big. My Ag teacher in school did fish raising and it was a pretty good sized tank in the back of the shop. Wasn't a 55 gallon barrel that's for sure. I think it was about 6-10ft diameter pool about 4-5ft deep. I would get in touch with the local fish hatchery for some great tips and info. This was almost 2 decades ago so my memory might be a little fuzzy on the dimensions.

freind of mine is converting his back yard pool into a fish pond. he's got about 50 tiny fish in it right now. you could buy a couple of the cheap 12 foot across above ground pools and use em for tanks but you are going to have to construct filters and aretors for them.

You listed some stuff I've done but I have yet to dabble in the fish catagory. I like. :D

Pigs eat a lot but if you do it right. You can certainly get a lot of food out of them. Remember though, one way to lower food costs is to feed them all your scraps by making a slop. Anything you put in the compost will work. Once they've "processed" it, you've still got your compost. <winks>