More High Density Catfish Farming

[frikkiedeboer]

interesting reaction to my posting. no, maths wasnt wrong and these fish can survive and even be raised in almost no water as they can breathe air.yes,i am still in the catfish industry but no longer in thailand since some guy figured out the visa-run thing,but i will be back in about a year after i recover from the hiding i took having to return to south africa and start over. my farm and my house and my broodstock are all being cared for and i will be selling catfish in less than three montths from the day i return. here is what i have been trying to post all day without sucess as i cant use a computer unless i am pissed and if this gets there it means i am,or was,given the five hour time difference between us.....hic

Firstly,thanx khonwan for your reply and interest and I will try to help with your biofilter at the end of this.

Here is some info about your catfish and the thai situation that you should know before you even think about starting up.

First: the only thais making money in the catfish game are those operating hatcheries( all those I saw were second-rate subsistence based operations overcharging for second-rate fingerlings); the wholesalers and the guys who have access to cheap animal by-products, usually rotten chicken or animal offal. Most operators are very small (most “big” operators producing about a ton or two a month in ponds) and most rear their fish for up to a year( in spite of what they will tell you-and because of the low protein value of the rotten chicken.) before selling off to wholesalers. The only reason that catfish are available countrywide all year round is because of the efficient transport system that the wholesalers operate, buying a ton or so at each producer and selling and buying as they travel. To produce anything near what will bring you any sort of income at all would require a huge piece of land with dozens of earth dams and a constant supply of water. The thais stock a maximum of 100 fish per square metre of surface area ( roughly correct for this type of subsistence farming) and to produce even a ton per month (which will not sustain you even if you do accidentally manage to make a profit) and this would mean you need twelve ponds of 50square metres each .then double this coz you will find that the stuff did not all grow out at the same rate, double it again coz you will lose half of them to frogs, birds, theft, floods, disease and the biggest one of all-CANNIBALISM (mainly due to varying grow-out rates of the second-rate fingerlings or fry you thought you got cheap.). This adds up to 48 ponds, huge investment and you will not be in the ball-game unless you are getting a fcr of better then 1.3:1(and this is borderline profit already and almost impossible on the low protein feeds available locally.

BUT……. There is hope. Raising catfish in Thailand has huge potential for profit if done correctly and most of the problems can be overcome if approached scientifically.

Here is what I did:

I tried the pond thing, sold my first 600kg and thought I made a profit then followed some idiot’s advice and raised in nets suspended in the water and thought I made a profit, maybe even did once or twice. Keeping records become impossible after I sold the second batch as about ten percent got sold first time off ( 60days rearing on pellets )then got raised some more and soon I had three batches of fish of different ages all mixed up in the nets and only found out after I weighed the ton or so of leftover fish of different sizes which died off over a three day period due to poor water quality-and yes I did use the EM and the lime (poon khow) and the oxytetracycline and only wasted my money. Wasted more time and money making my own feed from anything ranging from soya to rotten chicken –no good even if you get it free! (Although I have some recipes for really good home made stuff).

Then I got the information I needed and started making a profit by rearing the buggers in concrete tanks, with stocking density of 400kg per cubic metre. Produced my own fingerlings by artificially spawning the fast growers( “called shooters”) had total control over my operation, could easily recognise diseases and treat them before they became a problem, could supply small quantities 10kg at a time or more, and around 30 to 50kg per day to talaats, shops and the locals without netting a whole dam and being ripped off by livehaulers simply because I wasn’t stuck with a huge quantity of fish that I had to get rid of in a hurry. Just as it all came together the visa run thing caught me out and I am now working for a guy in South Africa, who produces farming systems and franchises them. A small farm here would be one producing 20 tons per month for export, and he supplies the complete technology-,tanks,filtration systems,manuals , training and aftermarket service and advice.

This system (high intensity catfish farming) is used all over Europe,Belgium,Holland,Germany,etc and is the only way to go.

Key to the whole thing is water quality, for which you need an efficient bio-filtration system. Your ton of catfish will be feeding on about 50kg of 38 percent protein feed per day if you are doing it right and should be growing at an average of 5 percent per day. Thailand has great weather so you do not have to heat the tanks as they have to overseas. Do not think you will save money using the cheaper low protein feed- you will only use more food in proportion and it is easy to calculate that you are actually paying more for the protein content of the feed and your fish will only get to market size after they have eaten the right amount of protein-in the thai situation mostly they get this by eating their brothers and sisters if you are not feeding them correctly.

There is plenty of info on the net about biofiltration and it is well worth the effort to study up on the biology and technology involved. It is a science all on its own and seems to be somewhat of a black art,but the heart of it all is aerobic bacteria which feed on the toxins produced by the catfish ,rendering them harmless and removing them so that the water can be reused. I also made use of a “vegetable filter” and this has huge potential if you have time to experiment,since you can clean your water and grow crops hydroponically in the same closed system.

The bacteria (not the catfish-they can survive without any dissolved oxygen) need oxygen-lots of it and a large surface area to live on. More oxygen and more bacteria means more efficient cleaning of the water. Large surface area means filter media –anything from brushes to broken pieces of pvc tubing to stone-chips and sand where the bacteria can be in contact with the oxygenated water and do their thing.

Professional systems are available but too expensive in the thai situation and it is best to study up and build one yourself. I am no expert in this field but by experimenting and constant modification and evolution I got to something that worked in my situation and it went like this: my land sloped down to a small dam about 30mx20m. I pumped water to a tank, via a 2”pvcpipe squashed into a nozzle by heating,squashing and cooling,then directing this down onto the surface of the water to produce a real froth, whipping up the surface and oxygenating it. Water from this tank flowed over a weir to a second settlement tank which I fitted with a baffle system made of the cheap asbestos board they have there, to slow the water down and allow settlement. Over another weir(more oxygen) to a tankl I filled with a pickup truck or three full of broken bits of “yit dang”- those little red clay bricks with the holes through the centre- and free from your local building supply. Huge surface area here. From there the water filtered upwards through holes into the next tank filled with that oxygen-weed you will find clogging up all the local ponds. The fern-like fronds provide a huge surface area for bacteria and in the day will provide oxygen too. Trick here is to make sure it doesn’t clog your feed to your rearing tanks. Get some of the mud from the bottom of a pond when they suck it dry-the stuff that smells like rotten eggs will provide bacteria to seed your system and run it for a few weeks before stocking-will work best after about five weeks.

Water was then gravity fed to my rearing tanks , where 4” upstand pipes controlled water level and allowed waste water to flow out to a small settlement pond before flowing over another weir and back to the dam. An expert could pick this system to pieces, and could tell you the plantfilter produces carbon dioxide at night and alters your ph,but it worked for me and cost almost nothing to build. Do not build your tanks thai style with the upstand pipe inside the tank-you want the shit to exit at the bottom of the tank. If you cant wait to weather the tanks,I found that the stuff they call “flintcote” made by shell,which is a water based bitumen,if diluted and painted onto new tanks allowed me to stock fish into new tanks after 24 hours. New cement tanks will kill your fish if not weathered or treated as the salts leach out of the cement into the water .

If I have not by now convinced everybody I really am a crank or bored everyone to death , you can rest assured that I have not even started to scratch the surface. If enough interest is generated,I will supply more boring but profitable information, and even some pictures if I ever learn how to work this freakin computer properly.

frikkie.

[Khonwan]

interesting reaction to my posting. no, maths wasnt wrong and these fish can survive and even be raised in almost no water as they can breathe air.yes,i am still in the catfish industry but no longer in thailand since some guy figured out the visa-run thing,but i will be back in about a year after i recover from the hiding i took having to return to south africa and start over. my farm and my house and my broodstock are all being cared for and i will be selling catfish in less than three montths from the day i return. here is what i have been trying to post all day without sucess as i cant use a computer unless i am pissed and if this gets there it means i am,or was,given the five hour time difference between us.....hic

Firstly,thanx khonwan for your reply and interest and I will try to help with your biofilter at the end of this.

Here is some info about your catfish and the thai situation that you should know before you even think about starting up.

First: the only thais making money in the catfish game are those operating hatcheries( all those I saw were second-rate subsistence based operations overcharging for second-rate fingerlings); the wholesalers and the guys who have access to cheap animal by-products, usually rotten chicken or animal offal. Most operators are very small (most “big” operators producing about a ton or two a month in ponds) and most rear their fish for up to a year( in spite of what they will tell you-and because of the low protein value of the rotten chicken.) before selling off to wholesalers. The only reason that catfish are available countrywide all year round is because of the efficient transport system that the wholesalers operate, buying a ton or so at each producer and selling and buying as they travel. To produce anything near what will bring you any sort of income at all would require a huge piece of land with dozens of earth dams and a constant supply of water. The thais stock a maximum of 100 fish per square metre of surface area ( roughly correct for this type of subsistence farming) and to produce even a ton per month (which will not sustain you even if you do accidentally manage to make a profit) and this would mean you need twelve ponds of 50square metres each .then double this coz you will find that the stuff did not all grow out at the same rate, double it again coz you will lose half of them to frogs, birds, theft, floods, disease and the biggest one of all-CANNIBALISM (mainly due to varying grow-out rates of the second-rate fingerlings or fry you thought you got cheap.). This adds up to 48 ponds, huge investment and you will not be in the ball-game unless you are getting a fcr of better then 1.3:1(and this is borderline profit already and almost impossible on the low protein feeds available locally.

BUT……. There is hope. Raising catfish in Thailand has huge potential for profit if done correctly and most of the problems can be overcome if approached scientifically.

Here is what I did:

I tried the pond thing, sold my first 600kg and thought I made a profit then followed some idiot’s advice and raised in nets suspended in the water and thought I made a profit, maybe even did once or twice. Keeping records become impossible after I sold the second batch as about ten percent got sold first time off ( 60days rearing on pellets )then got raised some more and soon I had three batches of fish of different ages all mixed up in the nets and only found out after I weighed the ton or so of leftover fish of different sizes which died off over a three day period due to poor water quality-and yes I did use the EM and the lime (poon khow) and the oxytetracycline and only wasted my money. Wasted more time and money making my own feed from anything ranging from soya to rotten chicken –no good even if you get it free! (Although I have some recipes for really good home made stuff).

Then I got the information I needed and started making a profit by rearing the buggers in concrete tanks, with stocking density of 400kg per cubic metre. Produced my own fingerlings by artificially spawning the fast growers( “called shooters”) had total control over my operation, could easily recognise diseases and treat them before they became a problem, could supply small quantities 10kg at a time or more, and around 30 to 50kg per day to talaats, shops and the locals without netting a whole dam and being ripped off by livehaulers simply because I wasn’t stuck with a huge quantity of fish that I had to get rid of in a hurry. Just as it all came together the visa run thing caught me out and I am now working for a guy in South Africa, who produces farming systems and franchises them. A small farm here would be one producing 20 tons per month for export, and he supplies the complete technology-,tanks,filtration systems,manuals , training and aftermarket service and advice.

This system (high intensity catfish farming) is used all over Europe,Belgium,Holland,Germany,etc and is the only way to go.

Key to the whole thing is water quality, for which you need an efficient bio-filtration system. Your ton of catfish will be feeding on about 50kg of 38 percent protein feed per day if you are doing it right and should be growing at an average of 5 percent per day. Thailand has great weather so you do not have to heat the tanks as they have to overseas. Do not think you will save money using the cheaper low protein feed- you will only use more food in proportion and it is easy to calculate that you are actually paying more for the protein content of the feed and your fish will only get to market size after they have eaten the right amount of protein-in the thai situation mostly they get this by eating their brothers and sisters if you are not feeding them correctly.

There is plenty of info on the net about biofiltration and it is well worth the effort to study up on the biology and technology involved. It is a science all on its own and seems to be somewhat of a black art,but the heart of it all is aerobic bacteria which feed on the toxins produced by the catfish ,rendering them harmless and removing them so that the water can be reused. I also made use of a “vegetable filter” and this has huge potential if you have time to experiment,since you can clean your water and grow crops hydroponically in the same closed system.

The bacteria (not the catfish-they can survive without any dissolved oxygen) need oxygen-lots of it and a large surface area to live on. More oxygen and more bacteria means more efficient cleaning of the water. Large surface area means filter media –anything from brushes to broken pieces of pvc tubing to stone-chips and sand where the bacteria can be in contact with the oxygenated water and do their thing.

Professional systems are available but too expensive in the thai situation and it is best to study up and build one yourself. I am no expert in this field but by experimenting and constant modification and evolution I got to something that worked in my situation and it went like this: my land sloped down to a small dam about 30mx20m. I pumped water to a tank, via a 2”pvcpipe squashed into a nozzle by heating,squashing and cooling,then directing this down onto the surface of the water to produce a real froth, whipping up the surface and oxygenating it. Water from this tank flowed over a weir to a second settlement tank which I fitted with a baffle system made of the cheap asbestos board they have there, to slow the water down and allow settlement. Over another weir(more oxygen) to a tankl I filled with a pickup truck or three full of broken bits of “yit dang”- those little red clay bricks with the holes through the centre- and free from your local building supply. Huge surface area here. From there the water filtered upwards through holes into the next tank filled with that oxygen-weed you will find clogging up all the local ponds. The fern-like fronds provide a huge surface area for bacteria and in the day will provide oxygen too. Trick here is to make sure it doesn’t clog your feed to your rearing tanks. Get some of the mud from the bottom of a pond when they suck it dry-the stuff that smells like rotten eggs will provide bacteria to seed your system and run it for a few weeks before stocking-will work best after about five weeks.

Water was then gravity fed to my rearing tanks , where 4” upstand pipes controlled water level and allowed waste water to flow out to a small settlement pond before flowing over another weir and back to the dam. An expert could pick this system to pieces, and could tell you the plantfilter produces carbon dioxide at night and alters your ph,but it worked for me and cost almost nothing to build. Do not build your tanks thai style with the upstand pipe inside the tank-you want the shit to exit at the bottom of the tank. If you cant wait to weather the tanks,I found that the stuff they call “flintcote” made by shell,which is a water based bitumen,if diluted and painted onto new tanks allowed me to stock fish into new tanks after 24 hours. New cement tanks will kill your fish if not weathered or treated as the salts leach out of the cement into the water .

If I have not by now convinced everybody I really am a crank or bored everyone to death , you can rest assured that I have not even started to scratch the surface. If enough interest is generated,I will supply more boring but profitable information, and even some pictures if I ever learn how to work this freakin computer properly.

frikkie.

Hi Frikkie - my second reply to you on this (first attempt got lost in cyberspace!).

Thanks for this. I am certainly interested and acknowledge the basic realities of the concepts you write about. I would like to read more from you.

Where do you buy 38% protein fish food in Thailand? The maximum I have found is 32%.

If making it yourself, I'm interested in your recipe.

How many months to achieve 250g? 333g?

Do you feed 38% all the way through?

You use the mature weight (at harvest) of the fish when calculating the stocking density, yes? Which weight are you using for your calculation? And therefor, how many fries are you introducing per cu.m.?

What percentage of fresh water are you replacing each day?

How does the frequency / intensity of disease compare to a non-intensive operation?

Aquaponics provides a very nice symbiotic relationship, but to what extent do you think it is necessary?

Replacing all the water EVERY hour seems challenging IF that were simply based on the tank(s) capacity, but since it must surely be based on the actual volume, which is only a small percentage of the tank capacity given the fishstock, this becomes a practical project for all, I should think. In that regard, perhaps it makes sense to "overstock" one tank initially before thinning out to a second tank as they grow, thereby conserving power. Thoughts please?

I'm sure I'll have many more questions once I fully digest your post. Please try to anticipate the questions I should be asking, and answer them too! Thanks.

[Somtham]

Frikkie - first of all, thanks for coming back and sharing more information. For a while there I thought you were going to do a hit and run.

I've read through the site Roy posted, several times and now your new post and I am interested in learning more and maybe even trying this.

Here's some numbers that I came up with based on what you have posted.

1. Harvest 400kg/m3 of water. Around here 250g fish is what people like to buy so we have 4*400=1600 fish planted. You mentioned cannabalism in your post and not sure if this still applies to the super intensive ponds or not. You didn't mention any fingerling "yields" in your post so I will use 80%. 1600/0.80=2000 fingerlings planted. You said you do your own breeding but let's assume the regular guy starting out needs to buy fingerlings. OK, 2000 fingerlings around 1 inch at B0.25 * 2000 = B500 for fingerlings.

2. You harvest 400kg of fish and achieve a FCR of 1.3. Like Khonwan, I'm not sure where you get 38% protein feed. I start fry on sinking prawn feed which is 40% protein. After about 10 days I switch to frog feed. Danm Chang has killed a few brain cells but I think it is 36% protein and the pellets are about 1mm diameter. Will check next time I go to the market. After about 7 days on the frog feed I use #1 floating pellets for about a month which is 34% protein. Growout is then done with #2 pellets which are 30% protein.

I pay B370 per 20kg bag (B18.5/kg) of the #1 pellets with 34% protein so I'll use that number for now. FCR at 1.3 times 400kg harvested times B18.5/kg is 1.3*400*18.5=B9,620 to feed your fish for the 3 month period. Mind you this is for 34% protein feed, not 38% which is undoubtly more expensive than B18.5/kg.

3. In another post you mentioned a water change rate of 1m3 every 30 minutes so 2m3 per hour or 33LPM. With minimal head in the system a 175 watt pump should be able to recycle the 33LPM. Around here I pay B6/kwh by the time I include all taxes, surcharges etc. So the cost of recycling is 0.175kw*24hrs*30days*3months*6 baht=B2268 per 3 month cycle for 400kg of harvested fish.

4. Last year I sold 25 tons of catfish at an average price of B33/kg so I'll use that number. Sell 400kg after 3 months at B33/kg = B13,200 gross revenue.

5. Minimal costs excluding labor and maintanence are fry B500, feed B9620, electricity B2268 =B12,388.

6. Net income is gross - expense = 13,200-12388=B812 for 3 months or B271/month.

Just doesn't jump out and say yeh, yeh, yeh. Go through my numbers and see if I've made a mistake. I'm trying to compare apples to apples to see what the "super intensive" provides over pond raised fish. As such, I've considered buying fry, not breeding; buying feed, not making your own; and selling to wholesalers, not direct.

It seems that the profits you made during your later days in LOS cannot be attributed to the super intensive stocking in 1m3 concrete ponds, but rather a combination of doing your own breeding and having better control over your FCR.

The real advantage I see to this type of super intensive farming is you can do it with very limited space and environmentally very friendly as it uses a minimum amount of water. Yes, you guys in BKK could grow a ton of fish in your spare bedroom at the condo!!

OK, a couple more questions for you.

You mentioned cannabalism. What breed of catfish did you raise in Thailand and did you have fish loss due to cannabalism in the 1m3 concrete tanks?

You also mentioned that 48 dirt ponds at 50m2 each (2400M2) may be able to produce a ton of fish per month. Last year I sold 25 tons of catfish. It was my first year and started with zero experience. We have ponds totalling ~2500 m2 and not all were on line for the entire year. They were brought on line 1 or 2 ponds at a time. So this year I would expect to sell over 35 tons of fish. Were you missimng something else in your first try with ponds only yielding 1 ton per month?

In your original post you advised NOT to make your own feed. In the above calculations for the 400kg of fish in 1 m3 the feed costs are 72% of your total costs. Why would you not consider making your own feed? 30% protein feed can be made for B11/kg whereas I buy that feed for B17.75/kg.

Been kind of busy lately but this week I will dig out some numbers I have for sizing settling ponds and biofilters for water recycling and post the info and websites.

Best regards and hope to hear your comments.

[frikkiedeboer]

just spent two hours using my single typing finger to try to get all queries adressed and somehow lost it all by trying not to lose it and tried to copy so i could paste it to a word document and it all disappeared when i went edit-copy before i sent it off and it has happened before and i hate this bloody computer and now im tired and drunk and will try agen on the weekend. i am not the worlds expert on this and tho i will try help out i can only help out with what worked for me. can tell you now,tho, that if you cut out the wholesaler you can sell at 40 to 50thb/kg and this, combined with the lower losses attributed to cannibalism-(no, it never goes away but if you breed your own you can limit it to a large degree. no you wont find 38% protien in thailand and i raised on the 32% stuff for 60 days per batch but didnt have the hassle of those non-performers that eat your feed and dont grow and they come from your thai hatchery and i will tell you why nextime. will show you how to calculate your electricty use and you will see that you can pump exactly the amount of water if you use my trick and it will cost you far less than a baht per kilo for the electricity and it is worth it cos of all the other places you will score and your fish only get sick if your water is bad and your water only goes bad if your filter is crap and you can diagnose and treat disease easily with cheap stuff in tanks that you cant in ponds and i will try to tell you all this nexttime cos now im gonna have another bottle of brandy and try to ignore the blister on my typing finger which is seriosly going to cramp my style on friday night but i will try to help soon ........hic.frikkie

[frikkiedeboer]

gesswot?!! found the bloody thing, so please disregard previous post

wow! this is going to be painful for my typing-finger. the intensive tank rearing is definitely more difficult and needs some trial and error before you will get it right-almost everything depending on how well your biofilter works. your catfish will not easily get diseases if your water quality is right-in fact this seems to be the main cause of disease-just a few days-sometimes a few hours- depending on how deep you are into it- of poor quality water and they will start turning belly-up, and of course in a fully recirculating system, at extremely high densities, water will be fouled far faster than in a pond with low stocking density-hence the importance of a good biofiltration system. however... you will notice the onset of a problem far faster than you would in a pond, and the main advantage is that the disease is easily treated before it becomes a problem. treatment in a large earth pond would work out very expensive and you are limited to very few choices-namely liming or the good old EM -in both cases you are improving water quality rather than treating the fish. of course,prevention is better than cure,and water quality is of paramount importance. most of the antifungal,antibacterial,superdooper modern treatments are not available or not translatable into thai,but the good news is that almost all the fungal (and this is the main reason why fish deaths occur-bacterial diseases seemed to account for very few) and bacterial diseases are easily treated with formaldehyde (formalin) cheap and readily available in thailand and totally harmless to your catfish if used in the right concentrations-you can safely use it on fry and hatchlings-even eggs (and impossible to use in a large earth pond) -i got mine at the local hospital at half the price the chemist was charging. unfortunately formalin will kill your biofilter so it is necessary to stop water circulation for about an hour,treat and then dump water and rinse before allowing water to re enter the filter. honestly, you will find little benefit in using the expensive and largely ineffective antibiotic available in thailand- and if you feel you must,rather use vichotep powder-as i said it has a higher concentration of active ingredient and at a very low price-nobody uses it coz it has a pic of a pig on the package and in thailand if it has a picture of a pig on it it is only for use on pigs-just ask my rocketscientist of a thai wife!- but read the ingredients list and you will see for yourself. the fish didnt seem to get diseases at all once i got the filter right, and they do not seem to transmit diseases to one another easily-rather if there is an outbreak they all get sick at the same time for the same reason. a rule of thumb-if your fish get sick,your water is sick-fix that and you probably dont need to us any medication.

once you notice dead fish floating on your earth pond you will have lost more fish and more fish will be infected before you know it than you can believe. this i noticed when first started rearing in the tanks, and before my system was working properly, since it seemed that only about ten percent of those that died floated-the rest remained on the bottom and mostly got eaten before they had decomposed to the stage when they would float.

most of the guys are exchanging water at a rate of once per hour or once every two hours .the water exchange seems to take place more completely in a smaller rectangular tank-mostly 2mx1m. my first tanks were 5mx4m and they didnt work too well. it is easy to calculate how much water you will need and buy the pump based on your needs-they all have a litre/hour rating and a kilowatt rating. yes electricity in thailand is relatively expensive, and your first batch on your pump you bought to supply two tons of fish with adequate water exchange is going to cost you about 2000thb per month-not good,but i got around it by using one tank as a reservoir,fitted a level cutout switch turned upside down(one of those safety cutout things from a broken submersible pump) you can use this on a twelve volt transformer to switch via a relay for the 240v supply if you worry about the safety aspect. then you can calculate how much supply you need according to the size of your fish,measure the amount of water gravity feeding your rearing tanks and adjust the flow accordingly, and the amount of time your pump runs -it will switch off automatically. once you are running flat out, your 14000l/hr 1kw motor is using rougly 700 units per month @ roughly 3.2thb/unit supplying a potential 7tons of fish. not a major issue if you consider the advantages using this system. by the way,there is an ad on the aquaafrica thingy i saw earlier that sez ram pumps run with no electricity-checked them out and tho expensive,could be the answer. saw it on tv in south africa a few years ago-dont know how it works but truly amazing-might be the answer.

the cannibalism thing can be a huge issue. of my first "home -made" batch of roughly 200000fry, i harvested less than 1000 fingerlings (of which about 50 were at least 20 times the size of their siblings and in prime condition!)-mainly thru my own ignorance and the fact that the available feed was not good enough. even the brine shrimp i got from bkk had about a 10% hatch-rate.

only way to limit the cannibalism is first to make sure that the beggars are getting enough of the right kind of feed ,and to sort the fingerlings at least three times during the first month or so of rearing. it is recommended that they be sorted into three size classes each time and the smallest size class be discarded each time. AND HERE IS THE THING: there is no ways that the thai hatchery is going to do this. it took me a long time to figure this out and cost me a huge amount of money. what happens is that these guys fertilise ponds with chickenshit a couple of days before stocking. algal blooms occur and with them the zooplankton-mostly daphnia (plus fry-eating copepods and other undesirables) fry are stocked at age of two days, before yolksac absorption. they do sort the fish, but instead of culling, the smallest size is held over and mixed with the matching size of the next batch, or the one after that, and again and again,resulting, as you will no doubt have noticed in wildly differing growth-rates- the big ones eat the smaller ones and compete for the feed. you then do everything right, monitor growthrate,fcr and come up with acceptable figures. maybe twice in a row,depending on supply and demand at the hatchery. then you sit back and figure you got a system going, fcr is acceptable for your situation and then you get the next batch that they re-sorted ten times that will just not grow out at all,no matter what you feed them or for how long! answer: breed your own. it is not just the saving on cost of fingerlings,but cost of losses, cost of feeding non-performers, sorting at harvest and by the way dont waste more money on trying to recoup by returning those that didnt make it to give them more time to grow out-these fish will cost you more in feed than they will sell for!

i didnt find 38% feed in thailand, so used the 32% but kept them on this for the full rearing period of 60days. this is why i said that the feed was poor quality. maybe a little unfair, since these guys are nutrition experts but have to cater for the thais, who will only buy the cheapest available, and selling price of the fish wouldnt warrant them producing a more expensive feed-they wouldnt sell a single bag! it is definitely false economy progressively feeding the bigger pellet,lower protien feeds coz if you work out the cost in relation to the protein content you actually pay more for the protien content of the cheaper feed.

the protien content in formulated feeds is normally derived from fishmeal, which is very expensive.

if you can make a 30% protien feed at 11 thb a kg then go for it-the cost savings will definitely compensate for the poorer fcr and resulting longer rearing period,but make sure you are really getting the protien content you think you are!. thai government has an information thing on how to produce your own feed-unfortunately based on fishmeal (as far as i can figure,it looks like a very good formulation,38%protien(surprise surprise) and if anybody wants it i will try to dig it out.

my flirtation with feed production went like this: i met one of those guys who produced "three tons of catfish per day" he had a contract with cpf for the waste left over after they had filletted the chicken carcasses. he was raising fish in 17 large ponds just outside of nakon rachassima, and i saw his operation and was actually quite impressed, and believed almost all of his bullsh#t. very nice fellow and fed me samgsom the whole evening.

i geared up with freezing facilities to store the stuff which he sold me for 3thb/kg,minced,packaged,loaded on my pickup-ice-the works.

mixed it up with condemned cassava flour and tried to dry it-the stench made even my bla-raa-munching thai neighbour complain to the amphoe.

the fish loved it- went apeshit when i threw in the stuff that the hordes of neighbourhood dogs and chickens didnt get-but they didnt grow. finally worked out the protien content from info i got off the net,and found out that my 3baht per kilo feed was costing me more than the fish were worth -if i worked out how much they would need to eat before they grew out, i was better off with the formulated feed-it was actually saving me money,never mind labour and the hassle of living with the stench of rotting chicken!.

the fishmeal is available at 60% protien. dilute this with your carbohydrate and you will find that you have little chance of fitting enough protien into a kilo of feed and still have enough space for your cheaper "filler" ingredients if you are using a lower protien ingredient.ie you cannot make 40% protien feed using a low protien source cos the sheer bulk of the stuff will not allow you to get the right percentage- your fish will eat only that much per day and the bulk that they would eat would not cater for their protien needs.

i did find something usable,tho i never tested it properly but it could be worth looking into. i maintained my broodstock fish on a diet of pigs blood mixed 50/50 with scrap cassava flour which costs 2thb/kg and a little poultry vitamin premix. i got info that cattle blood is extremely high in protien and it could be worth looking into. any feed you can make is going to take time,and hassle and the cost savings must compensate for this. the broodfish did well and it is easy to mix,dries almost immediately because of blood's clotting properties,but yoiu cant refrigerate for any length of time coz it seems to seperate into a liquid and a jelly. if you had one of those bakery mixer things it may mash it all back up agen but it is very hard to do by hand-.and it doesnt smell. might be worth buying cheap chickenmeal and "adding value" by adding blood to get protien level acceptable. never got very far with my enquiries but the "farang" battery chicken are raised in thailand on a diet that takes them from day-old chick to full grown in 45 days-so if you could convince a few bags to fall off the back of a truck...... bottom line is without a good lab to do the testing for us or having studied it we are all farting around in the dark

no, i didnt make a profit selling to the wholesalers and cannot figure how anybody really can. i sold at 40thb/kilo to all the "mom and pop" shops, at 50thb to anyone who wanted less than 5kg- miimpossible if you are netting two tons at a time,but easy from a tank using a landing net!.you will be shocked at how much of the stuff is consumed by the thais. our local primary school had 600lo learners-to give you an idea of the size of the village and this moo baan alone was worth 700kg per month. at first they wouldnt buy,but gesswot? their option is to go to the next town 30km away to get it at the same price from the market there (where i sell,too,tho cheaper rate coz they buy 50kg per day), and pretty soon they start buying,coz when there is a shortage (often,especially during winter) the locals come directly to me and cut them out if they cant supply.thais will tell you that "pladouk na" tastes the best and farmed catfish are crap.fact is there are very few "pladouk-na" and they buy the stuff raised on rotten chicken that the talaat gets from the livehaulers which stinks when they gut it (those that bother to).

then there is a shortage and they buy from the farang who raises clean catfish on pellets that dont stink-that dont come with gaping wounds from rough handling and they taste better and soon they wont buy the shit that came from the market-fact.once you get them to this stage,start mixing the "ooei" with some "lakseer"( pladouk-yak which is your african sharptooth catfish from south africa which is a far better culture fish than the miserable ooei -and the reason they hybridise them in the first place) soon you get a reputation,and now you are selling the lakseer at 40 and 50baht a kilo -(what did that livehauler pay for it!??). maybe turnover is lower but profits are higher .you lose fewer fish to cannibalism,your fish grow at a uniform rate, you dont buy shit fingerlings that dont grow and if you get to produce a quality feed cheap,please share it with us all-the market is big enough for us all-see just one thai selling 3tons per day and not even making an impact!!! frikkie

[frikkiedeboer]

interesting reaction to my posting. no, maths wasnt wrong and these fish can survive and even be raised in almost no water as they can breathe air.yes,i am still in the catfish industry but no longer in thailand since some guy figured out the visa-run thing,but i will be back in about a year after i recover from the hiding i took having to return to south africa and start over. my farm and my house and my broodstock are all being cared for and i will be selling catfish in less than three montths from the day i return. here is what i have been trying to post all day without sucess as i cant use a computer unless i am pissed and if this gets there it means i am,or was,given the five hour time difference between us.....hic

Firstly,thanx khonwan for your reply and interest and I will try to help with your biofilter at the end of this.

Here is some info about your catfish and the thai situation that you should know before you even think about starting up.

First: the only thais making money in the catfish game are those operating hatcheries( all those I saw were second-rate subsistence based operations overcharging for second-rate fingerlings); the wholesalers and the guys who have access to cheap animal by-products, usually rotten chicken or animal offal. Most operators are very small (most "big" operators producing about a ton or two a month in ponds) and most rear their fish for up to a year( in spite of what they will tell you-and because of the low protein value of the rotten chicken.) before selling off to wholesalers. The only reason that catfish are available countrywide all year round is because of the efficient transport system that the wholesalers operate, buying a ton or so at each producer and selling and buying as they travel. To produce anything near what will bring you any sort of income at all would require a huge piece of land with dozens of earth dams and a constant supply of water. The thais stock a maximum of 100 fish per square metre of surface area ( roughly correct for this type of subsistence farming) and to produce even a ton per month (which will not sustain you even if you do accidentally manage to make a profit) and this would mean you need twelve ponds of 50square metres each .then double this coz you will find that the stuff did not all grow out at the same rate, double it again coz you will lose half of them to frogs, birds, theft, floods, disease and the biggest one of all-CANNIBALISM (mainly due to varying grow-out rates of the second-rate fingerlings or fry you thought you got cheap.). This adds up to 48 ponds, huge investment and you will not be in the ball-game unless you are getting a fcr of better then 1.3:1(and this is borderline profit already and almost impossible on the low protein feeds available locally.

BUT……. There is hope. Raising catfish in Thailand has huge potential for profit if done correctly and most of the problems can be overcome if approached scientifically.

Here is what I did:

I tried the pond thing, sold my first 600kg and thought I made a profit then followed some idiot's advice and raised in nets suspended in the water and thought I made a profit, maybe even did once or twice. Keeping records become impossible after I sold the second batch as about ten percent got sold first time off ( 60days rearing on pellets )then got raised some more and soon I had three batches of fish of different ages all mixed up in the nets and only found out after I weighed the ton or so of leftover fish of different sizes which died off over a three day period due to poor water quality-and yes I did use the EM and the lime (poon khow) and the oxytetracycline and only wasted my money. Wasted more time and money making my own feed from anything ranging from soya to rotten chicken –no good even if you get it free! (Although I have some recipes for really good home made stuff).

Then I got the information I needed and started making a profit by rearing the buggers in concrete tanks, with stocking density of 400kg per cubic metre. Produced my own fingerlings by artificially spawning the fast growers( "called shooters") had total control over my operation, could easily recognise diseases and treat them before they became a problem, could supply small quantities 10kg at a time or more, and around 30 to 50kg per day to talaats, shops and the locals without netting a whole dam and being ripped off by livehaulers simply because I wasn't stuck with a huge quantity of fish that I had to get rid of in a hurry. Just as it all came together the visa run thing caught me out and I am now working for a guy in South Africa, who produces farming systems and franchises them. A small farm here would be one producing 20 tons per month for export, and he supplies the complete technology-,tanks,filtration systems,manuals , training and aftermarket service and advice.

This system (high intensity catfish farming) is used all over Europe,Belgium,Holland,Germany,etc and is the only way to go.

Key to the whole thing is water quality, for which you need an efficient bio-filtration system. Your ton of catfish will be feeding on about 50kg of 38 percent protein feed per day if you are doing it right and should be growing at an average of 5 percent per day. Thailand has great weather so you do not have to heat the tanks as they have to overseas. Do not think you will save money using the cheaper low protein feed- you will only use more food in proportion and it is easy to calculate that you are actually paying more for the protein content of the feed and your fish will only get to market size after they have eaten the right amount of protein-in the thai situation mostly they get this by eating their brothers and sisters if you are not feeding them correctly.

There is plenty of info on the net about biofiltration and it is well worth the effort to study up on the biology and technology involved. It is a science all on its own and seems to be somewhat of a black art,but the heart of it all is aerobic bacteria which feed on the toxins produced by the catfish ,rendering them harmless and removing them so that the water can be reused. I also made use of a "vegetable filter" and this has huge potential if you have time to experiment,since you can clean your water and grow crops hydroponically in the same closed system.

The bacteria (not the catfish-they can survive without any dissolved oxygen) need oxygen-lots of it and a large surface area to live on. More oxygen and more bacteria means more efficient cleaning of the water. Large surface area means filter media –anything from brushes to broken pieces of pvc tubing to stone-chips and sand where the bacteria can be in contact with the oxygenated water and do their thing.

Professional systems are available but too expensive in the thai situation and it is best to study up and build one yourself. I am no expert in this field but by experimenting and constant modification and evolution I got to something that worked in my situation and it went like this: my land sloped down to a small dam about 30mx20m. I pumped water to a tank, via a 2"pvcpipe squashed into a nozzle by heating,squashing and cooling,then directing this down onto the surface of the water to produce a real froth, whipping up the surface and oxygenating it. Water from this tank flowed over a weir to a second settlement tank which I fitted with a baffle system made of the cheap asbestos board they have there, to slow the water down and allow settlement. Over another weir(more oxygen) to a tankl I filled with a pickup truck or three full of broken bits of "yit dang"- those little red clay bricks with the holes through the centre- and free from your local building supply. Huge surface area here. From there the water filtered upwards through holes into the next tank filled with that oxygen-weed you will find clogging up all the local ponds. The fern-like fronds provide a huge surface area for bacteria and in the day will provide oxygen too. Trick here is to make sure it doesn't clog your feed to your rearing tanks. Get some of the mud from the bottom of a pond when they suck it dry-the stuff that smells like rotten eggs will provide bacteria to seed your system and run it for a few weeks before stocking-will work best after about five weeks.

Water was then gravity fed to my rearing tanks , where 4" upstand pipes controlled water level and allowed waste water to flow out to a small settlement pond before flowing over another weir and back to the dam. An expert could pick this system to pieces, and could tell you the plantfilter produces carbon dioxide at night and alters your ph,but it worked for me and cost almost nothing to build. Do not build your tanks thai style with the upstand pipe inside the tank-you want the shit to exit at the bottom of the tank. If you cant wait to weather the tanks,I found that the stuff they call "flintcote" made by shell,which is a water based bitumen,if diluted and painted onto new tanks allowed me to stock fish into new tanks after 24 hours. New cement tanks will kill your fish if not weathered or treated as the salts leach out of the cement into the water .

If I have not by now convinced everybody I really am a crank or bored everyone to death , you can rest assured that I have not even started to scratch the surface. If enough interest is generated,I will supply more boring but profitable information, and even some pictures if I ever learn how to work this freakin computer properly.

frikkie.

Hi Frikkie - my second reply to you on this (first attempt got lost in cyberspace!).

Thanks for this. I am certainly interested and acknowledge the basic realities of the concepts you write about. I would like to read more from you.

Where do you buy 38% protein fish food in Thailand? The maximum I have found is 32%.

If making it yourself, I'm interested in your recipe.

How many months to achieve 250g? 333g?

Do you feed 38% all the way through?

You use the mature weight (at harvest) of the fish when calculating the stocking density, yes? Which weight are you using for your calculation? And therefor, how many fries are you introducing per cu.m.?

What percentage of fresh water are you replacing each day?

How does the frequency / intensity of disease compare to a non-intensive operation?

Aquaponics provides a very nice symbiotic relationship, but to what extent do you think it is necessary?

Replacing all the water EVERY hour seems challenging IF that were simply based on the tank(s) capacity, but since it must surely be based on the actual volume, which is only a small percentage of the tank capacity given the fishstock, this becomes a practical project for all, I should think. In that regard, perhaps it makes sense to "overstock" one tank initially before thinning out to a second tank as they grow, thereby conserving power. Thoughts please?

I'm sure I'll have many more questions once I fully digest your post. Please try to anticipate the questions I should be asking, and answer them too! Thanks.

[Penkoprod]

The only thing wrong with this is the "tall poppy syndrome"

Once a falang starts making a success there seems to be a built in mechanism within the Thai mentality that says this shouldnt be happening, and, within a short space of time, farm after farm will spring up, using the same methods, but with "subsistance level" processing and marketing until, eventually the market will be saturated with cheaper and cheaper product.

Remember, the Thais are NOT great inovators, but greater imitators/copiers

Penkoprod

[Khonwan]

The only thing wrong with this is the "tall poppy syndrome"

Once a falang starts making a success there seems to be a built in mechanism within the Thai mentality that says this shouldnt be happening, and, within a short space of time, farm after farm will spring up, using the same methods, but with "subsistance level" processing and marketing until, eventually the market will be saturated with cheaper and cheaper product.

Remember, the Thais are NOT great inovators, but greater imitators/copiers

Penkoprod

Well, as tough as such consequences may be for me as a farang farmer, I constantly endeavour to pass on any learned skills to my Thai farming neighbours. I see this as my social responsibility; my contribution to my community. I shall be only too pleased should the standard of living in the community improve as a result, even should any resultant reduction in market price inconvenience me personally. After-all, THE reason for the granting of Work Permits is to facilitate the exchange of technological skills and ideas to the betterment of the Thai people.

Besides, aren't we forum readers also trying to catch up with the tall poppies? Most of us (and I certainly include myself!) participate in this forum because we wish to transition from being wannabe farmers to being real farmers who enjoy the financial rewards of our labours. Our Thai neighbours are just doing the same to the best of their abilities, as limited by their poorer education and economic circumstances.

Rgds

Khonwan

[Khonwan]

3. In another post (Frikkiedeboer) mentioned a water change rate of 1m3 every 30 minutes so 2m3 per hour or 33LPM. With minimal head in the system a 175 watt pump should be able to recycle the 33LPM. Around here I pay B6/kwh by the time I include all taxes, surcharges etc. So the cost of recycling is 0.175kw*24hrs*30days*3months*6 baht=B2268 per 3 month cycle for 400kg of harvested fish.

Somtham, et al

To help you understand your electricity costs should you consider a biofiltration system:

You (Somtham) are probably already consuming around 400 units per month. Additional units over 400 units are currently priced by PEA at 2.9780 baht. You then have to add the Ft cost-of-fuel adjustment (which can change from month to month - the rate I quote is/was correct as of February 2007). This is currently 0.7342 baht per unit. Together, you now have 3.7122 baht. Add 7% VAT, you pay a total of 3.9721 baht per unit after 400 units consumed. Thus, a 175W pump working 24hrs per day for 30 days would cost you an additional 500 baht per month, or 1,500 baht over 3 months.

BTW, the unit charge band of "more than 400 units" is the highest charge band set by PEA. It may also be worthwhile looking into to Time-of-use / Off-peak meters. I have the rates for these also but haven't calculated

them yet.

These rates apply to you, Somtham, since, although you have a three-phase supply, your supply is from the standard 220V per phase low voltage supply. Anyone, such as me, who draws their power from the high voltage cables via their own transformer (be it single or three phase) would pay an additional 431 baht per month for this additional 126 units (0.175kW x 24hrs x 30 days = 126 units) rather than 500 baht. This is because such customers pay a standard 2.4649 baht per unit (no charge bands) plus the same Ft charge of 0.7342 baht per unit (currently) plus 7% VAT. Don't think you are being done though - we "transformers" pay 200.70 baht more per month for our standing charge.

(Note: I'm only using 175W since that is the rating of the pump Somtham mentioned.)

Rgds

Khonwan

[chownah]

Other considerations about the cost of power:

1. A 175 watt pump only draws 175 watts when it is working at its maximum capacity which means pumping at its highest pressure rating...if you are not working with that much pressure then you will be consuming less power.....thus your consumption may be less than you think.

2. The power factor for the motor needs to be taken into consideration....this could mean you are consuming more power than you think.

3. If power consumption is a major cost (seems like it might be) then you would do well to get a more efficient pumping system. Generally speaking a pump with larger diameter inlets and outlets pumping through larger pipes will be more efficient and another way to look at this is that the slower the water moves in the pipes the more efficient your pumping system will be both because you will have less hydraulic friction with slower moving water and because you don't have to use energy to accelerate the water to the higher velocity. Also an axial flow pump is inately more efficient than a radial flow pump....centrifugal pumps are radial flow....turbine pumps are axial flow....turbine pumps are more efficient....the cheapest turbine pump you will find is the tube pump usually used with two wheeled tractors but thay are also often run with small gas 4 stroke engines and they can be run with electric motors too. I don't know for sure but I'm reasonably certain that these tube pumps would seriously reduce your pumping costs but their flow rates are so high that you would probably need to build some storage and then cycle the pump on and off to top up the storage. Smaller turbine pumps exist but I have never seen them in Thailand...but then I've never really looked. A good irrigation supply house should be able to get these but I'm not sure.

Chownah

[Khonwan]

Other considerations about the cost of power:

1. A 175 watt pump only draws 175 watts when it is working at its maximum capacity which means pumping at its highest pressure rating...if you are not working with that much pressure then you will be consuming less power.....thus your consumption may be less than you think.

2. The power factor for the motor needs to be taken into consideration....this could mean you are consuming more power than you think.

A 175W pump will clock up 0.175 units for each hour it operates regardless of the power factor or pressure.

[chownah]

Other considerations about the cost of power:

1. A 175 watt pump only draws 175 watts when it is working at its maximum capacity which means pumping at its highest pressure rating...if you are not working with that much pressure then you will be consuming less power.....thus your consumption may be less than you think.

2. The power factor for the motor needs to be taken into consideration....this could mean you are consuming more power than you think.

A 175W pump will clock up 0.175 units for each hour it operates regardless of the power factor or pressure.

Is it your opinion that a 175 watt motor consumes the same amount of electricity if it is running with no load as when it is loaded to its maximum power rating?

It is my opinion that an electric motor has a power curve which shows how much power is being used depending on the load and that the higher the load the higher the power consumed so long as you stay within operating specs.

I went to the internet and at this site:

http://www.eng-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid...815&page=10

found this which shows how to calculate how much power is needed to drive a pump depending on how the pump is loaded:

"

Artisi (Mechanical) 14 Jul 06 3:08

If you have selected the pump from a pump performance curve it would normally have the power curve shown as well, if not, the easy way to calculate the power at the point of consideration is,

Q*H*SG/102*E = kW

Q = (litres/sec)

H= (metres)

E= pump efficiency - as a decimal - at the point of consideration

S.G. = 1 if water

102 = constant to assemble all the other factors and conversions.

This gives you the power requirement at the "duty point", from here you need to consider a number of other factors which comes down to experience of pumping systems;"

I found this by googling "electric motor power curve"....there were lots of other sites that discussed this idea in greater detail and in various situations....if the one that I have reproduced is not convincing.

I think you will find that the harder an electric motor is working the more current it draws and therefore the more power it consumes and that the pressure that a pump is working against is a major determinant of how hard it is working....the higher the pressure it is pumping to the harder it is working....generally speaking.

You can also verify this by running a pump with a valve wide open and observing at your electric meter how fast the wheel turns....then close the valve until you can hear the motor working harder and go check again how fast the wheel is spinning.

Chownah

[Somtham]

3. In another post (Frikkiedeboer) mentioned a water change rate of 1m3 every 30 minutes so 2m3 per hour or 33LPM. With minimal head in the system a 175 watt pump should be able to recycle the 33LPM. Around here I pay B6/kwh by the time I include all taxes, surcharges etc. So the cost of recycling is 0.175kw*24hrs*30days*3months*6 baht=B2268 per 3 month cycle for 400kg of harvested fish.

Somtham, et al

To help you understand your electricity costs should you consider a biofiltration system:

You (Somtham) are probably already consuming around 400 units per month. Additional units over 400 units are currently priced by PEA at 2.9780 baht. You then have to add the Ft cost-of-fuel adjustment (which can change from month to month - the rate I quote is/was correct as of February 2007). This is currently 0.7342 baht per unit. Together, you now have 3.7122 baht. Add 7% VAT, you pay a total of 3.9721 baht per unit after 400 units consumed. Thus, a 175W pump working 24hrs per day for 30 days would cost you an additional 500 baht per month, or 1,500 baht over 3 months.

BTW, the unit charge band of "more than 400 units" is the highest charge band set by PEA. It may also be worthwhile looking into to Time-of-use / Off-peak meters. I have the rates for these also but haven't calculated

them yet.

These rates apply to you, Somtham, since, although you have a three-phase supply, your supply is from the standard 220V per phase low voltage supply. Anyone, such as me, who draws their power from the high voltage cables via their own transformer (be it single or three phase) would pay an additional 431 baht per month for this additional 126 units (0.175kW x 24hrs x 30 days = 126 units) rather than 500 baht. This is because such customers pay a standard 2.4649 baht per unit (no charge bands) plus the same Ft charge of 0.7342 baht per unit (currently) plus 7% VAT. Don't think you are being done though - we "transformers" pay 200.70 baht more per month for our standing charge.

(Note: I'm only using 175W since that is the rating of the pump Somtham mentioned.)

Rgds

Khonwan

This months electric bill should be coming in the next week. I'll go through it and see what the charges are per unit.

thanks for the info.

[RasiMike]

The only thing wrong with this is the "tall poppy syndrome"

Once a falang starts making a success there seems to be a built in mechanism within the Thai mentality that says this shouldnt be happening, and, within a short space of time, farm after farm will spring up, using the same methods, but with "subsistance level" processing and marketing until, eventually the market will be saturated with cheaper and cheaper product.

Remember, the Thais are NOT great inovators, but greater imitators/copiers

Penkoprod

Well, as tough as such consequences may be for me as a farang farmer, I constantly endeavour to pass on any learned skills to my Thai farming neighbours. I see this as my social responsibility; my contribution to my community. I shall be only too pleased should the standard of living in the community improve as a result, even should any resultant reduction in market price inconvenience me personally. After-all, THE reason for the granting of Work Permits is to facilitate the exchange of technological skills and ideas to the betterment of the Thai people.

Besides, aren't we forum readers also trying to catch up with the tall poppies? Most of us (and I certainly include myself!) participate in this forum because we wish to transition from being wannabe farmers to being real farmers who enjoy the financial rewards of our labours. Our Thai neighbours are just doing the same to the best of their abilities, as limited by their poorer education and economic circumstances.

Rgds

Khonwan

[frikkiedeboer]

The only thing wrong with this is the "tall poppy syndrome"

Once a falang starts making a success there seems to be a built in mechanism within the Thai mentality that says this shouldnt be happening, and, within a short space of time, farm after farm will spring up, using the same methods, but with "subsistance level" processing and marketing until, eventually the market will be saturated with cheaper and cheaper product.

Remember, the Thais are NOT great inovators, but greater imitators/copiers

Penkoprod

fortunately (or unfortunately-depending on from which angle you view it, there seems to be a mental/cultural block against trying any method ,in agriculture anyway, which contradicts what they were taught by their ancestors. as you will know,their traditional ways are very well entrenched and fortunately for the thais they have been able to get away with it for years. if you even begin to talk to them about technical aspects of farming you will notice that they may listen politely for a few moments, then the curtain comes down and the lights go off and he is thinking "bullsh#t bullsh#t bullsh..."

in our village i tried to teach them how to raise in tanks,even set up a system at the local high school so they could learn to do it properly, because i figured i could supply them fingerlings , which are cheap and easy to produce and profits are far higher than in raising the things high, and got no response at all even though they were always asking " why can the farang do it and we havent been able to?"

it is true that as soon as they see one guy making a buck< they all imitate him (in our village it is the mushroom thing at the moment) and those that are prepared to put in the effort produce a crop or two and kill the local market (but not the selling price,somehow, then lose interest and go onto something else.

go for it and dont fret about anybody else getting hold of the technology and killing the market. if you get it going properly there is a huge export market -japan,brunei,holland etc and you will quite frankly make more exporting than selling locally in the unlikely event that aspirant thai culturists do manage to screw up the market. one farm here in south africa was exporting 20tons per month to japan and last time i heard,this guy taught the technology to the local population,gave them the tanks and simply bought the product from them and exported it at a profit.

[Khonwan]

Frikkie

You said, "Just as it all came together the visa run thing caught me out and I am now working for a guy in South Africa".

So how successful were you? I cannot understand why you had to give it all up and leave Thailand just because of the changes in the visa regulations. As has been noted by others in the visa forum, nearly anyone who really wants to be here, can! I obviously do not know of your circumstances, but, couldn't you have set up a company and received a work permit along with extension of stay? I'm assuming you have no Thai wife, and that you are not yet 50 since were either of those to apply, you should have no difficulty staying.

[frikkiedeboer]

Frikkie - first of all, thanks for coming back and sharing more information. For a while there I thought you were going to do a hit and run.

I've read through the site Roy posted, several times and now your new post and I am interested in learning more and maybe even trying this.

Here's some numbers that I came up with based on what you have posted.

1. Harvest 400kg/m3 of water. Around here 250g fish is what people like to buy so we have 4*400=1600 fish planted. You mentioned cannabalism in your post and not sure if this still applies to the super intensive ponds or not. You didn't mention any fingerling "yields" in your post so I will use 80%. 1600/0.80=2000 fingerlings planted. You said you do your own breeding but let's assume the regular guy starting out needs to buy fingerlings. OK, 2000 fingerlings around 1 inch at B0.25 * 2000 = B500 for fingerlings.

2. You harvest 400kg of fish and achieve a FCR of 1.3. Like Khonwan, I'm not sure where you get 38% protein feed. I start fry on sinking prawn feed which is 40% protein. After about 10 days I switch to frog feed. Danm Chang has killed a few brain cells but I think it is 36% protein and the pellets are about 1mm diameter. Will check next time I go to the market. After about 7 days on the frog feed I use #1 floating pellets for about a month which is 34% protein. Growout is then done with #2 pellets which are 30% protein.

I pay B370 per 20kg bag (B18.5/kg) of the #1 pellets with 34% protein so I'll use that number for now. FCR at 1.3 times 400kg harvested times B18.5/kg is 1.3*400*18.5=B9,620 to feed your fish for the 3 month period. Mind you this is for 34% protein feed, not 38% which is undoubtly more expensive than B18.5/kg.

3. In another post you mentioned a water change rate of 1m3 every 30 minutes so 2m3 per hour or 33LPM. With minimal head in the system a 175 watt pump should be able to recycle the 33LPM. Around here I pay B6/kwh by the time I include all taxes, surcharges etc. So the cost of recycling is 0.175kw*24hrs*30days*3months*6 baht=B2268 per 3 month cycle for 400kg of harvested fish.

4. Last year I sold 25 tons of catfish at an average price of B33/kg so I'll use that number. Sell 400kg after 3 months at B33/kg = B13,200 gross revenue.

5. Minimal costs excluding labor and maintanence are fry B500, feed B9620, electricity B2268 =B12,388.

6. Net income is gross - expense = 13,200-12388=B812 for 3 months or B271/month.

Just doesn't jump out and say yeh, yeh, yeh. Go through my numbers and see if I've made a mistake. I'm trying to compare apples to apples to see what the "super intensive" provides over pond raised fish. As such, I've considered buying fry, not breeding; buying feed, not making your own; and selling to wholesalers, not direct.

It seems that the profits you made during your later days in LOS cannot be attributed to the super intensive stocking in 1m3 concrete ponds, but rather a combination of doing your own breeding and having better control over your FCR.

The real advantage I see to this type of super intensive farming is you can do it with very limited space and environmentally very friendly as it uses a minimum amount of water. Yes, you guys in BKK could grow a ton of fish in your spare bedroom at the condo!!

OK, a couple more questions for you.

You mentioned cannabalism. What breed of catfish did you raise in Thailand and did you have fish loss due to cannabalism in the 1m3 concrete tanks?

You also mentioned that 48 dirt ponds at 50m2 each (2400M2) may be able to produce a ton of fish per month. Last year I sold 25 tons of catfish. It was my first year and started with zero experience. We have ponds totalling ~2500 m2 and not all were on line for the entire year. They were brought on line 1 or 2 ponds at a time. So this year I would expect to sell over 35 tons of fish. Were you missimng something else in your first try with ponds only yielding 1 ton per month?

In your original post you advised NOT to make your own feed. In the above calculations for the 400kg of fish in 1 m3 the feed costs are 72% of your total costs. Why would you not consider making your own feed? 30% protein feed can be made for B11/kg whereas I buy that feed for B17.75/kg.

Been kind of busy lately but this week I will dig out some numbers I have for sizing settling ponds and biofilters for water recycling and post the info and websites.

Best regards and hope to hear your comments.

HERE ARE THE FIGURES FROM MY ATTEMPT AT REARING IN EARTH PONDS

feed....................thb30000 20thb/kg,enough to produce a ton fcr1.5:1

fingerlings............12500thb. 12500 fish @ 0.75 thb each 3.5cm long

almost compensated for the "disappearences"

and "beeg oei" eat each other at the same

rate as does gariepinus (lakseer)

medication.............700thb large tin of otc i was

told would counter the "floater"

phenomenon

electricity 000thb of course you didnt need to

pump any water after you

emptied your pond to harvest

or fill the pond in the first place

or compensate for evaporation

or seepage

labour 0 assume your thai family didnt get

you to supply the booze after

they sweated the whole day

harvesting your fish for free

TOTAL COST THB43200

SALES THB18000 half of the second rate fingerlings

didnt even get 1.5:1 fcr and the wholesaler

bought at THB29/kg

LOSS THB25200 only winners were the hatchery and the

wholesaler

ONE TON PRODUCED IN SMALL TANK:

FEED THB 26000 20THB/KG

FINGERLINGS THB 700 about 200000 fingerlings-excess sold

off at 0.5thb each including those

i would have discarded because the

thais do not believe there is such a

thing as a non performing fish-

netted THB8000 just stocking the tanks

i set up for the school

ELECTRICITY THB 2000 this becomes a monthly

expense but since you are

stocking for 3tons once a month

can actually be reduced by two thirds

MEDICATION THB70 two bottles formaldehyde i

used as a prophylactic

in the hatchery

TOTAL COST THB28770

SALE THB 42800 "mom and pop" shops @

40/kg and the rest at 50/kg to

the locals

PROFIT PER TON THB14030/ton and i deliberarely didnt

add in the hatchery

sales, and used 1ton

per month as an example only

i gave up on the whole home made feed thing because of lack of proper knowledge

but would of course do so if i knew it could be done right,as any business orientated person would take advantage of such a huge cost savings. by the way your thai friend

who makes his own knows all about digestable energy levels,amino acids etc and can accurately measure and produce his own methionone and gets his protein at a ridiculously low cost,so i bow to his superior knowledge but until i have completed a degree in nutrition i will rather use what is at my disposal, even tho i know it is not the best.

obviously i didnt get the pond thing right and i wonder why,if it were so much easier and more profitable, everybody isnt doing it and making a killing.

[frikkiedeboer]

Frikkie

You said, "Just as it all came together the visa run thing caught me out and I am now working for a guy in South Africa".

So how successful were you? I cannot understand why you had to give it all up and leave Thailand just because of the changes in the visa regulations. As has been noted by others in the visa forum, nearly anyone who really wants to be here, can! I obviously do not know of your circumstances, but, couldn't you have set up a company and received a work permit along with extension of stay? I'm assuming you have no Thai wife, and that you are not yet 50 since were either of those to apply, you should have no difficulty staying.

not yet 50 and ###### thai wife made off with all the money. had just enough left to secure a divorce and get the land safe and legal. had to make a decision as whether to borrow enough money to keep feeding catfish or return here and earn enough to get my retirement visa next year and get back there to farm catfish and take evil revenge on her and her thieving relatives ...oh AND that cow of a lawyer who made off with nearly as much as the ex did!

[Khonwan]

Frikkie

You said, "Just as it all came together the visa run thing caught me out and I am now working for a guy in South Africa".

So how successful were you? I cannot understand why you had to give it all up and leave Thailand just because of the changes in the visa regulations. As has been noted by others in the visa forum, nearly anyone who really wants to be here, can! I obviously do not know of your circumstances, but, couldn't you have set up a company and received a work permit along with extension of stay? I'm assuming you have no Thai wife, and that you are not yet 50 since were either of those to apply, you should have no difficulty staying.

not yet 50 and ###### thai wife made off with all the money. had just enough left to secure a divorce and get the land safe and legal. had to make a decision as whether to borrow enough money to keep feeding catfish or return here and earn enough to get my retirement visa next year and get back there to farm catfish and take evil revenge on her and her thieving relatives ...oh AND that cow of a lawyer who made off with nearly as much as the ex did!

Ah...I see!