Reef-Farm operations - Page 4

raaden · #76 04/17/2007, 07:57 AM

As for the rest of the q's

the light properties of Sunrise and Sunset are almost identical in my area. You can see some differences in some places (i.e. if you are East or West of a big city). Things that will cause Sunrise and Sunset to be different are mostly things that create atmospheric disturbance; weather, smog, dust/sandstorms that occur to one side or the other of your location. All anomalies ignored Sunrise and sunset are going to produce light very high in the nm spectrum and will appear deep yellow to deep red. Whereas light in the midday will shift to the lower nm spectrum and will give you a bluer hue. This has huge affects on photosynthesizing organisms which I won't get into here but if you are interested I can give you more info personally. My setup will shade for a good portion of the sunrise and sunset (which for my intentions will be a huge plus), and will have almost direct light for the midday. Once again this was intentional and was a large part of why i chose this particular location.

The trees that you see form a sort of Horseshoe around the area leaving the South open completely for the most part. This is completely what I was looking for. Like I said above I was looking for something that would shade 30-40% of the sunrise and sunset but still leave me unblocked daytime light once the sun reaches about 20 degrees. With the south being open I will get less shading in the winter (again a huge plus when there is less light to be had) and will still be able to get the light needed even on the shortest days. Being in a souther latitude I will also get a longer daylight period in the winter than northern latitudes, another plus.

As far as grants, I am not sure how it is in the UK but most of the grants I was able to find are mostly performance grants. What I mean by that is that you can get a grant to do a certain study or produce a certain paper. I would love to have found a grant for setting up the facility but unfortunately I wasn't able to find anything that applied. I attribute that to this being such a new type of operation. I found plenty of money if I wanted to setup a food producing aquaculture facility, but I am not sure anyone would eat Ricordeas or Leathers,

I don't understand why

. My intention is to get up and running and then start looking into the performance grants.

It doesn't surprise me that you were denied your saltwater access, especially if it is near a protected area. In the US it is pretty much the same way. I looked into this in Virginia Beach, and I couldn't even setup my operations within 5 miles of the beach for fear that something might happen in my facility and release something into the ocean or into the surrounding protected areas.

If I were you I would ask for more information or a summary of why you are being banned from Cites imports. I have ideas why, but I won't go into them here. I would also ask them if they are referring to Cites listed corals or Cites covered corals. I think there is a difference, and one would mean you can't even bring in aquacultured versions of those corals as well. Nammy and I were talking about this, and my understanding is that you can import certified aquacultured corals even if they are cites listed/covered without a permit or levies. I would look into that and if you find that it is true let me know and I will get you what you need.

I am looking to start with a combination of softies (mostly rics, xenia, leathers, some zo's), some sps (mostly acros, but a few monti's) and macroalgae, as well as feeding supplies(phyto-, and zoo-planktons).

I am planning on getting my broodstock from all over, but like most others I will start with what I have already and see how it goes from there.

When you do make it to the States look me up, hopefully by then I will have something working and I can take you on a tour.

BallaBooyeaH · #77 04/17/2007, 08:26 AM

WIll take you up on that offer of a tour. Before i take the plunge I plan on visiting yourself / Steven Pro / Dude in Florida and also Ricky rocket.

On this I will plan the best setup for what I want to achieve and hopefully take way what works and what does not.

I have followed rickey's thread and when it all went bad - it put a big damper on my idea's - but better to learn from someone that has hit a wall than to do it your self.

I have sent of responses regarding the CITES and I feel that I should get around this. I am currently getting and going through 2000 liters of natural seawater at the moment - Rather than telling the guys at the wharf it is for the tank at home - I want the premit so I am not codding anyone. well it is also going i my tank at home once setup.

Without the NSW I could not turn a profit - even tho already small on the live rock. i have had 1000kg for 3 weeks now - sold 80kg and a further 160 ouit next week. I am doing the rounds in Dublin next week to tie up retail shops and dropping off samples of the product. I should have my invert system live this weekend and have my first shipment of snails / crabs and shrimps ready for the call around to the shops.

Once this channel is setup I will sell the aquacultured corals to them and I can also look at the export to the UK where I believe they are all chop shops over there and no one is aquaculturing under the sun - only MH.

So that is the plan. see how it panns out - keeping the day job till things are cosy enought to pay the bills from proffits - but I can see this is going to take some time.

Steve - By the way - I have the Aquamedic 5000 Shorth running - Doing a grest job, She is pulling out a nice smelly skimiate from the LR vat - I have it running with the Big monster skimmer just to test it out. Must say - I am happy with it.

Andrew

raaden · #78 04/19/2007, 11:28 AM

Well things are looking good for the plastic this weekend. I have a few people that have offered to help, and the weather looks good. I hope with the bad weather behind us now that things will go smoothly and this makes for a good weekend. If I can get the plastic up on all the sides that would be a huge step. That will allow me to wire up the electric and start mounting the equipment. Then all i need is to get a vat builder and I will have stuff out there in no time.

Balla,
I definitely know what you mean watching Ricks thread. There was a couple of times when I wasn't sure if I would be able to pull it off, but seeing his persistence and determination reminded me that all it takes is hard work and a will do mindset and it will happen.

Good work on getting some customers and making the initial sales. I know that must feel good. If you lose out on the Nat SW thing you should look into what Dick Perrin has done. He has been running a similar setup in Michigan and does it completely without water changes. I am going to try this out on a few sections and hope that I can do the same.

It is definitely a time investment. With my latest revision to the plan, I am considering the first 16 months to be all investment with little return while all the growout happens. Then once I have a good set of broodstock I will start to piece out sales. The only exception is that I might try to break even on costs through selling for the winter. It is hard to convince the wife that I will be spending the amount of money I am anticipating with nothing coming in.

BallaBooyeaH · #79 04/19/2007, 02:45 PM

Hey Raaden,

Well meet up with the local business helpers her ein Ireland - Went over my plans for the PT and aquaculture - Showed them my (your modified) BP and they were intrested.
They are going to work with me to get a BP prepared for the Enterprise board in Ireland looking for funding.
Deal with grants over here is the product must be export - Fine as the market here is so small and it must be a wholesale product - fine again.

So I need to get them some more information and I can model it from other is the USA for the BP. So I am hoping yourself Steve and others can help me so I can see if this can happen.

What I need is the following;
Firstly a list of other PT growers that you know of - Ricky, The guy in Florida - can't remember his name or find the thread and others - Anthony Calfo etc.
I need to map out the European market for wholesale / channels / competitors and the retail spend in the industry - I can get that wasy enough.
I need to show the strengths and weakness of the business, Threats and oppoutunities - i guess something along the line of Pharma companys using stony corls would also be helpful.

I guess I am in BP mode and will need to get spot on for the financials. Can you tell me if an aquacultured coral gets a higher price than a wild piece? I assume it would due to the known environment.
Can you tell me who would be the major wholsellers that buy the finished product in the USA? is there balance sheet public or are they private companies?

Anyone who can help on this it would be appriciated.

Does anyone know of anyone in Europe doing a PT for aquaculture?

Thanks

Andrew

crazzy · #80 04/19/2007, 09:09 PM

There was, a while back discussions on what type of Plastic to cover the greenhouse with to allow proper penetration of wavelengths of sunlight required by Corals. What plastic did you decide to use?

raaden · #81 04/20/2007, 07:18 AM

Balla,

If I can help let me know I think you have my personal email, but if not pm me and I'll get it to you.

The growers I know of are:
using a true polytunnel are Rick Rottet, Steven Pro, Phillip Root, Myself, hamburglar (for a little while) and treeman. Than Thein wrote a business plan but I am not sure he got much further than that.
There are quite a few using modified Greenhouse setups with true sunlight, but not true polytunnels. Those are redox, ORA (although they no longer have a parent company and the future is a bit unsure for them), Dr Mac and sons, Dick Perrin, Dr.s Foster and Smith, and some others I can't remember.
There are countless overseas places using lagoon based aquaculture but I am not sure they will give you any precedent because they are not far removed from wild growth and collection. Walt Smith comes to mind.

We can talk offline on the additional uses of corals by Pharma and university studies, I know of one person here at NC State that just finished a pretty indepth study on antibiotic production of a variety of corals. I also know of 2 biotech companies local here that are considering studies but nothing official.

Pricing and acceptance, that is the 64k question. I'm sure you saw the section in the BP about it and we talked a bit on the thread, but my experience was that most retailers were either going to want prices competitive or significantly lower for AC corals. I think that if you try to sell to a retailer you are going to have a tough time trying to get a premium. If you sell retail or through the internet you might get a small premium but I am going to stay away from those right now.
As far as who will buy wholesale from you in the USA: just about anyone will if your production is stable and your quality and price meet their needs.

raaden · #82 04/20/2007, 07:52 AM

crazzy,
I should first say that I went kinda out on my own with my thoughts on coverings. I never got a direct response from Anthony regarding his thoughts on what I was suggesting but in reading his other posts on coverings he is not in favor of using what are called boutique coverings (coverings with special coatings to enhance the covering). He suggests using a straight clear covering with uv protection.

With that said I originally planned on using a boutique product called Klerks KL-380. That product was designed to block/relfect (read: not absorb/modify) any light with wavelength shorter than 380 nm. For conventional greenhouses this produces a strong cooling effect as about 20% of the heat in a greenhouse is from this light. For a GH in the south that is a huge benefit by itself but the biggest reason I was looking at this film is that, while I was doing my research I was looking at a large variety of research from Hawai'i on detrimental effects of UV spectrum on growth/death rates of corals. It seemed to me that this covering went along with the recommendation of the papers and would be well worth the added expense.

Unfortunately when I finally got to order my GH it was 'reskinning season' and this film was unavailable to small orders until atleast the end of May. When I placed my original order it was the fall and it was available but I had to cancel that order and decided to wait through the winter.

What I am going to end up using is one layer of Greentech UV protected clear for the outer layer and one layer of Greentech IR/AC for the inner. The outer layer is a standard clear like what Anthony recommends, and the outer is a standard clear with a coating to reduce Infrared infiltration both into and out of the GH. I am hoping that will help with the gas bill in the winter by reflecting back the Infrared heat. It also has an anticondensate coating which will help the water not collect on the plastic.

I am still in favor of the UV film and am planning on using it when I expand or reskin, as I have talked to a few conventional GH owners who have used it and are pretty happy with it and it makes a huge difference in the summer temps and surprisingly humidity levels.

crazzy · #83 04/20/2007, 02:24 PM

Raaden, first let me thank you for your openness in your GH threads and not holding back "proprietary" thoughts, this goes a long way to opening up and enhancing this "addiction" When I first got into Salt Water in 1981 in Canada, the North American attitudes/thoughts were light years behind the European, but it has come a long way. Again Thanx for your sharing your endeavors.
On this subject which you have answered here: Plastic film, in a different thread, one person had brought up the utilization of glass instead of plastic as being substantially better. Any info/thoughts on this? Different types of glass? Glass films or other for blocking harmful (for corals) UV ?
When you talk about an inner and an outer layer, are you separating them like they do in Canada with a low pressure blower to separate them for insulation/lower heat bills?
All the best in your venture and good luck with it.

raaden · #84 04/20/2007, 02:41 PM

crazzy,

Thanx for the kind words, I can't speak for everyone but IME most of the people I have spoken with on this type of venture are pretty open about their thoughts. Most of the idea mongering that I have seen is on the retail side, and I attribute that to the slim margins and the old school ideas that someone is going to come along and steal your ideas. The people in this sort of endeavor are more like scientists to me and in that sort of a community there is usually a pretty open door as far as sharing.

As for me I am committed to this venture and I feel that the best way for this to work long term is the open exchange of ideas and findings. I know that I could not be this far along if it weren't for all of the people that I have talked to and all of the ideas I have gotten from them. I also would like to see this hobby advance and I feel that the best way for that to happen is to get mass market momentum (try that one fast) behind it. Coral farming seems a logical first step in that direction.

As for the idea of glass; for me it was never a consideration. Glass would indeed block UV but its fragility, and cost made it far too difficult for serious consideration. If I were given a greenhouse covered in glass I would surely use it, but would probably not build one even if the costs were the same. I am not aware of a glass film that is available so I can't really comment on that.

The two layers of poly that I am using are just as you say. There is a small blower forcing air between the two layers and the insulation comes more from the air layer than it does from the poly itself.

Thanx again and I will need all the luck I can get

BallaBooyeaH · #85 04/24/2007, 05:58 AM

pm sent raaden

raaden · #86 05/01/2007, 10:12 AM

The plastic has been pulled and the outside is just about done. Sorry to be so long between updates. It has been quite a week (probably the most productive week yet) since last weekend when we started the plastic. There has been alot of progress on the stucture and when you look at it in person it looks like an operational greenhouse... if only that were the case

.

This past week I really started to put in some serious time (overtime as the case may be) on the greenhouse as I am finally getting to the point where I can have a couple of projects working at the same time. We got the plastic completed, hung the shutters on the endwall where the evap cooler will go, hung the door, wired up the breaker boxes for the electricity, started running the water mains into the GH and tested the inflation of the poly layers. It was some seriously heavy work but it felt so good making progress on it.

There is still so much to do, and it seems (just like everyone else doing this sort of project) that for everything I get done some sort of problem creeps up somewhere else. The issues I am working on this week are:
The blower that I was sent to inflate the GH seems a bit overpowered, and is putting some serious pressure into the gap between the layers of plastic. It almost seems as if the seal around the edges of the plastic is too tight...

The fiberglass vats may not be an option. The original builder of the vats is unavailable and a couple of fallback options will probably not work out either so I am entertaining other ideas for making the vats. I am starting a new thread to try to get ideas and feedback on what I can do here . I have a few ideas but if anyone has any others please check this thread out and let me know what you think.

I also am a little concerned with the overall weight of the facility. This is something that I never really looked into but at full capacity the overall weight of the facility will be in the neighborhood of 100 tons with much of it raised on stands without footers. It is built on some of the finest and toughest clay I have seen, but with no footings and being at the top of a hill I am a little worried that the ground will shift a bit. Not a whole lot I can do about it now, but it is something that I will keep an eye on.

Overall this past week has been great, although ridiuculously busy, and things should be moving quickly from here on in. The plan for the upcoming week is to further seal up the edges around the equipment and start working on getting the rest of the equipment installed and operational. I also want to solidify my plans for building (or buying) the vats and if I need to build them I want to get started on them pretty soon, hopefully by the beginning of next week.

jaws_too · #87 05/01/2007, 09:30 PM

Thats nice! very cool

hatfielj · #88 05/01/2007, 10:16 PM

Looks awesome! I can't wait to see it completed. IMO I wouldn't worry about the weight of the facility at all. 100 tons is heavy, but its not heavy enough to move the earth! I'm 100% sure you'll be fine and run into no problems because of weight...knock on wood

RedSonja · #89 05/02/2007, 09:38 AM

Looking good! It is so exciting to see it coming along!

No other ideas yet on what to do about vats.

Hopefully someone will come up with an idea that works and won't break the budget. You and Greg should sit down and just brainstorm it, between the two of you I bet you can figure something out.

I'm not the engineer of the operation, I'll leave that to y'all.

-Sonja

Whaledriver · #90 05/02/2007, 04:44 PM

Awesome!
I am living a dream job vicariously through your project.

raaden · #91 05/03/2007, 07:51 AM

Well this week has been a scorcher so far and the plastic certainly has held up under almost 90 degree weather (>130 in the GH with no fans running). Today we have a good chance of getting some rain so I can see how the ground holds up with a bunch of water dumped on it.

I also ended up getting a different blower (about 1/4th the size of the one they sent me) and it is even a bit stronger than what I need. I have the inlet almost completely shut and it is keeping up like a champ. I am definitely going to have to spend a weekend tightening the plastic as the air pocket in a few spots is almost 2.5 ft thick. Thats some good insulation :P.

Sonja,
I am not sure i have Gregs email... If you get a chance send it to me. I would love to hash out some ideas.

WhaleDriver,
Fantastic, now I get a chance to crush two peoples dreams... :/

raaden · #92 05/10/2007, 08:00 AM

Another week of good progress and the outside construction is finished. Construction tasks completed this week include: mounting the motors to the shutters, constructing and mounting the exhaust fans, mounting the breaker box and wiring it up, starting the inside wiring, planning out the inside electrical runs, inflating the greenhouse, and sealing up the base of the Greenhouse. All in all a very good week.

For the coming week I want to get the inside wiring a bit further, start on the evap cooler, get a solid plan for the vat construction, and start working on the cutting benches. If I can get all that done by the middle of next week I should be well on my way to getting livestock in the GH by the end of the month.

BallaBooyeaH · #93 05/10/2007, 09:13 AM

Radden - You are flying. keep it up.

For the Vat's Look what I have done for holdsing vat for my rock.

I got IBC containers at €70 each and chopped off the top - can be larger than I did but I need to fit them under the stand i have.

Where you cut them it is sharp as I have learnt with many cuts to my arms from reaching in. So I just placed 1/2" end caps on them to stop cut me all the time.

Sump for the invert system - currently full of rock

Invert system with the holding IBC tank below holding the cured rock.

redox · #94 05/10/2007, 10:24 AM

unfortunatly those galvenized frames are going to rust real bad

crazzy · #95 05/10/2007, 11:08 AM

I posted this on your other thread re:
"Why not try to find those (48"X48"X48") stacking heavy duty food usable square bins. Some reefers have used them in the large reef tank section as large sumps. New, they are about $300.oo for 400 gallon capacity. Easy to drill etc. Indestructable!"
Pics won't copy to here but if you go to "dacocorp.com" you will see all types which are Fork Liftable, stackable and in the price range I believe you are looking for. Just find a local supplier (I am sure Dyson buys them by the thousands for their chicken operations)

BallaBooyeaH · #96 05/10/2007, 11:24 AM

Why not try to give them a coat of Hammerite or other coating you have in the USA that protects the metal ???

I plan on getting 3 years out of the containers without any coverings? Will have to wait and see...

RedSonja · #97 05/10/2007, 11:25 AM

Thanks for the update raaden, wow, it's a greenhouse for real now!

Btw the RARE meeting is this Saturday instead of Monday, 3pm at Aquacade and I'm still doing the demonstration.

-Sonja

GreshamH · #98 05/10/2007, 12:16 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by raaden
Nammy and I were talking about this, and my understanding is that you can import certified aquacultured corals even if they are cites listed/covered without a permit or levies. I would look into that and if you find that it is true let me know and I will get you what you need.

In the USA, AC or wild, they all fall under CITES protection and require permits. No stony coral (CITES listed and coverred) can be imported with out a permit into the USA. US F & W S requires the permit to right off your shipment and allow it entrance to the US.

Being there is no reconized "certification" of AC corals by the USA or CITES, that is a moot point

redox · #99 05/10/2007, 04:54 PM

hey Raaden looks like you got all the tools in the shop laying out on the floor

was the frame staight or does that guy need lessons?

Serioussnaps · #**100** 05/11/2007, 01:04 PM

Raaden....where exactly are you doing this? Near RTP? just curious....nice week by the way