Update on Plants and Methods to Keep Fish Warm

    Through the end of October to November of 2013 (about 3-4 months into the aquaponics project) I was trying to find easy/quick/cheap ways to keep everything warm since the temperatures were beginning to drop. The main objective was to move the system into an area that gets more sunlight throughout the day and to add an insulated cooler to retain heat. I painted the cooler black with spray paint which helped to keep things held over until I finally had a weekend available to move things into a greenhouse that my wonderful Girlfriend bought me as a surprise one day. When moving the fish to the cooler I managed to finally count how many fish that I had lost during the past few months. I had around 60 goldfish at the start and I counted 51 when I switched tanks. Since I took a couple out to live in a fish-tank at my apartment I had only lost 7 goldfish, which was almost unbelievable to me. Fortunately the goldfish are VERY resilient fish that didn't mind the few nights that the water temperature got down into the low 40s before the greenhouse was built around the aquaponics unit.