Our Fish Farming Experiment....

[Somtham]

Chris B. - We have managed to go astray, more than once, from the original topic so I went back and read your first post. Have you found a buyer and determined a price yet?

If you're thinking, "I planted 8000 fingerlings divided by 4 fish/kg I should harvest 2000kg times B30 equals B60,000. Oh yeh." You may well be disappointed. First off, unless you counted your 8000 fish when you bought them, like my first few buys, you probably did not really get 8000 fish. My 3rd buy I finally got wise and counted the 6000 fish I had just bought. 2,989. Yep, less than half. The seller never made it right either so obviously I don't buy from him. On another occassion I bought 4800 and received ~3000. Just this week I bought pla keat, 10/kg, from whom I thought was very reputable dealer. He said there were 1255kg but you can weigh them if you like. I did and paid him for 1017kg. I saved over B6k. Lesson learned - count your fish.

You've probably had some fish that checked in but never left the hospital. 2 or 3 here, 2 or 3 there. They add up.

Pests. They will eat into your profits. I have 2 major ones that I deal with. Monitor lizards that visit from the klong in back of the property. I now trap them and release them in the river about 6km away. If they want to find their way home then they deserve a good catfish buffet. The other is the birds, I think Egrets, but not sure. The white and/or brown guys you see hanging out in the paddy fields all day. Each one will eat 3 or 4 fish for breakfast and then bring his buddies back with him for dinner. It adds up.

Then there ore others that just "disappear". I have no idea where they went. Let me know if you harvest more than about a 65% yield or 1300kg.

Chok dee

[Tim207]

Pests. They will eat into your profits. I have 2 major ones that I deal with. Monitor lizards that visit from the klong in back of the property. I now trap them and release them in the river about 6km away. If they want to find their way home then they deserve a good catfish buffet. The other is the birds, I think Egrets, but not sure. The white and/or brown guys you see hanging out in the paddy fields all day. Each one will eat 3 or 4 fish for breakfast and then bring his buddies back with him for dinner. It adds up.

Then there ore others that just "disappear". I have no idea where they went. Let me know if you harvest more than about a 65% yield or 1300kg.

Chok dee

Predation is a major problem. I know several fish farmers here and I hear a lot of stories. A pair of otters found their way into a hatchery and killed A LOT of fish, it was probably a game for them. A bear was caught visiting a holding pond nightly when it was found the pond was loosing a lot of fish. Racoon family having a party in a shallow pond. All that is no comparrison though to the daily bird theft. We have egrets and great blue herons here also and they are protected by law. You need a permit to shoot them and they are very hard to discourage. One farmer I know has a permit to kill a number per year and as an experiment he cut one open to see how much he was eating. He had 54 fingerlings in his stomach. I have seen these things catch fish up to a half kilo and swallow them whole. If you are finding fish with what looks like stab wounds you probably have a bird problem. When fishing is easy they will be lazy about keeping the fish they have stabbed with their beak and often they will loose them. Many of these fish will survive so it isn't as easy as just finding dead fish to see the problem. If you see a fish with a sore see if there is actually a whole. There will also be scars after healing. Beautiful birds, but they can be very expensive to have around.

[Somtham]

Predation is a major problem. I know several fish farmers here and I hear a lot of stories. A pair of otters found their way into a hatchery and killed A LOT of fish, it was probably a game for them. A bear was caught visiting a holding pond nightly when it was found the pond was loosing a lot of fish. Racoon family having a party in a shallow pond. All that is no comparrison though to the daily bird theft. We have egrets and great blue herons here also and they are protected by law. You need a permit to shoot them and they are very hard to discourage. One farmer I know has a permit to kill a number per year and as an experiment he cut one open to see how much he was eating. He had 54 fingerlings in his stomach. I have seen these things catch fish up to a half kilo and swallow them whole. If you are finding fish with what looks like stab wounds you probably have a bird problem. When fishing is easy they will be lazy about keeping the fish they have stabbed with their beak and often they will loose them. Many of these fish will survive so it isn't as easy as just finding dead fish to see the problem. If you see a fish with a sore see if there is actually a whole. There will also be scars after healing. Beautiful birds, but they can be very expensive to have around.

We definately have a bird problem. they come around at dawn and dusk just about every day. The workers have made scare crows, hung beer Chang bottles, empty of course, to jingle in the wind and I've seen some farmers string 00 fishing hooks around a pond. For now the best deterant I've come up with is plain old physical presence. They have great eye sight and when they see me coming they're outta there.

I guess you're in CA, Sacramento Delta area. Whereabouts are you and what fish are you farming?

[teletiger]

Have you tried a model of a hawk, or similar, on a perch near the ponds? A lot of airports use these.

Regards

[Tim207]

We definately have a bird problem. they come around at dawn and dusk just about every day. The workers have made scare crows, hung beer Chang bottles, empty of course, to jingle in the wind and I've seen some farmers string 00 fishing hooks around a pond. For now the best deterant I've come up with is plain old physical presence. They have great eye sight and when they see me coming they're outta there.

I guess you're in CA, Sacramento Delta area. Whereabouts are you and what fish are you farming?

I am in the midwest. The incidents described took place in Wisconsin and Minnesota. The farms I have experienece with are all trout.

I have heard or a lot of deterents for the birds but none have been successful. One guy even enclosed a pond in netting. The herons congregated on top looking down at the fish until there was enough weight to colapse the net. I have heard a theory of hanging old CDs on string because they flash in the light as the wind moves them. I have not heard if it works though. I had a thought for a friend who's coy pond was being attacked by racoons at night. I had him try a motion sensor attached to a radio and a light. Everytime the racoons came the light and radio turned on scaring them away. It worked well against racoons but no one has tried it on the birds yet. They get pretty brave after a while. If you don't run at them they will just ignore you. I go back and forth between love and hate with those things. On one hand I enjoy their courage and tenacity. I also like to watch them throw a fish in the air and swallow it whole. On the other hand that is about 120 baht I am watching slide down his throat and for every fish they miss their is a damaged fish swimming around. Customers don't like to see big soars on their fish.

[Chris.B]

I have some experience with fish farming (not catfish) and this sounds like something I might want to do as a hobby in the future. I would be interested to know what size the fingerlings were when you got them.

About 2 inches long.

I am trying to figure your growth rate and get an idea of your conversion rate. With the high cost of food and low sale price the conversion rate will be key. 1.2 would be about the best I think you could do all factors being ideal, I expect the actual rate will be much higher. This means that for every 1.2 killos of food you put in you get 1 killo of gained fish weight. At 20 baht per kilo for food you are paying 24 baht per kilo of fish weight gain. Bump that up to a more reasonable 1.8 you are paying 36 baht per kilo gain. If you have no experience or have not done a lot of reading your ratio could be much higher. If you are doing this for fun great but if you are counting on profits I think you will be dissapointed considering the numbers I have seen here.

Tim, as you see by the title of thread this is our practical experiment. Sure, I am doing it for fun as well but for the experiment to be successful then a profit should be made. You figures are logical and make sense they are also worrying, you seem to prove it is impossible to raise fish on fish food and make a profit.

For comparison, you are paying approximately the same for food as you would pay in the US. The problem is that where you are looking at a RETAIL sales price for the fish of 45 baht, here the WHOLESALE sale price is around 190 baht. Yes, different fish, different sales market, but that doesn't matter. The point is your feed inputs are the same cost with a far tighter margin. You need to maximize conversion (as anybody does) and lower feed costs. There has to be a cheaper food supplier, especially if you buy in bulk.

At the moment I am forcasting selling 8000 fish at 4 fish per kilo which equals 2000 kg. Now at a 1:1.2 ratio that would equal 120 (20kg) bags. We are not anywhere near that yet. Probably more like 20 bags. This doesn't seem to make sense I know. Will get more info soon.

[Tim207]

--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Chris.B @ 2006-10-25 04:44:13) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->

At the moment I am forcasting selling 8000 fish at 4 fish per kilo which equals 2000 kg. Now at a 1:1.2 ratio that would equal 120 (20kg) bags. We are not anywhere near that yet. Probably more like 20 bags. This doesn't seem to make sense I know. Will get more info soon.

Like I said, I don't know catfish (especialy in Thailand) but something is obviously amiss with the calculations here, probably due to several factors. A few off the top of my head are:

1) You don't have as many fish as you thought

2) You are mistaken in the number of bags you have used

3) Someone is adding other supplemental "free" food such as kitchen waste or rotten fruit etc.

4) They are eating a lot of insect ( actually, come to think of it you might benefit by adding a night light over the water to attract bugs)

I suspect that the discrepancy is a combination of some or all of these factors. Somtam stated in an earlier post that he has been shorted by up to half of his purchase. I think this might be a big factor here.

You probably already know this but seeing as this is a new experiment for you, it may not have occured to you. If you want to get a fairly accurate estimate of the number of fingerlings you are getting, put some water in a bucket then weigh the bucket. Count out a number of fish, the more the better, and add them to the bucket. You can then use the weight difference to calculate an approximate number of fish per kilo. Once you know how many fish per kilo you can repeat the process without counting the fish, just note the weight difference of each successive bucket of water before and after adding a bunch of fish. When finished you can add up the weight of fish and multiply by the number of fish per kilo you got in the first step. This will get you a fairly good estimate without the tedium of counting thousands of fish and will also reduce the stress on the fish.

I don't know the method the Thai suppliers use but you might want to find a way to incorporate this method into your purchase agreement before the sellers represents a specific number of fish supplied. If Somtam's experience holds true for you, it would be awkward if you counted your suppliers 8000 fish in front of him and found there were only 4000. You might ask him how many fish per kilo, then verify his number as explained above and only then tell him how many kilos you want at that size. Then you can proceed to weigh out what would approximate the number of fish you want. Not knowing the normal procedure in Thailand, this may not be feasible but I hope it helps.

I am entrigued by your experiment and would greatly appreciate it if you posted your progress and results. Any details that you are willing to add would also be helpfull such as when you got the fish, current average weight per fish using the above method, and if you discover their has been any supplemental feed. My wife has expressed an interest in raising fish and though I wouldn't want to do it on a large scale, I would like to do it with her as a hobby that at least pays for itself.

Edited October 25, 2006 by Tim207

[Maizefarmer]

I have a neighbour who farms catfish - I told him that recurrent theme for farangs just starting out in the business was that they just never seemed to get the amount of fish they are buying.

He laughed - says you won't, unless count them. Dont be suprized if you get only half of what you think you are buying.

There is a slightly diffeent technique for counting them which depends on the size of the fingerling but it all comes down to taken a sample of a known amount (he suggests 25) 4 times over. Weighing them in batches of 25, adding it up and dividing that total by 100 - then you have to take off a percentage for water that is stuck to the skin of the fish, and that percentage changes depending on the size of the fingerlings you are buying.

Then take a known volume of water - he says 10 litres (10kg) in a 20-25 litre container (which leaves space for up to 200 - 250 fingerlings), and add fish accordingly - till the weight increases to the same amount as the hundred fish you weighed before hand (or adjusted according to how fish you are intending to count out per time).

Thsi methodology he assures me will be accurate to within 5 - 10% with amounts of up to 10 000 fish in total.

Of course the more fish you count out per time (hence the use of a 25litre container with onyl about 10 litres of water in it to count out the fish) the quicker you can get throught he counting.

10 000 fingerlings shouldn't take you more than 10 minutes he reackons.

Tim

[Somtham]

--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Chris.B @ 2006-10-25 04:44:13) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->

At the moment I am forcasting selling 8000 fish at 4 fish per kilo which equals 2000 kg. Now at a 1:1.2 ratio that would equal 120 (20kg) bags. We are not anywhere near that yet. Probably more like 20 bags. This doesn't seem to make sense I know. Will get more info soon.

Chris - When I started harvesting the first ponds several months ago the wholesaler would always ask "how much are you feeding each day?". He would say that for each 20kg bag of food per day per pond you should get 1000kg of harvested fish ( a ratio of 1:50). We have harvested 4 ponds in the last 6 weeks and the ratio for us is more like 1:100. So every 20kg bag of food per day, just before harvest, we are yielding about 2000kg of fish. Ask you partner the weight of food she's feeding now per day, multiply it by 75 and you should get a ballpark number for the weight of your fish in the 2 ponds.

Like I said, I don't know catfish (especialy in Thailand) but something is obviously amiss with the calculations here, probably due to several factors. A few off the top of my head are:

1) You don't have as many fish as you thought

I suspect ths is the case. There are quite a number of shady characters out there that don't mind ripping off a farang/newbie to the business.

I don't know the method the Thai suppliers use but you might want to find a way to incorporate this method into your purchase agreement before the sellers represents a specific number of fish supplied. If Somtam's experience holds true for you, it would be awkward if you counted your suppliers 8000 fish in front of him and found there were only 4000. You might ask him how many fish per kilo, then verify his number as explained above and only then tell him how many kilos you want at that size. Then you can proceed to weigh out what would approximate the number of fish you want. Not knowing the normal procedure in Thailand, this may not be feasible but I hope it helps.

I've experienced three methods here in Thailand.

1. The guy delivers the fish to our ponds. Rushes to dump the bags of fish into the pond and says "there's your 6000 fish". Live and learn.

2. Sold by volume. They'll count out 1000 fish and then put them in a small container with holes so all the water drips out. The'll then fill this container to that point for ecery 1000 fish you want.

3. Sold by weight. Same thing. Count 1000 fish, weigh them and then repeat the process for your order.

I should also add that I have found 3 what I think are reputable seller's and all them add at least another 10% of fish to my orders.

rgds

[Somtham]

- then you have to take off a percentage for water that is stuck to the skin of the fish, and that percentage changes depending on the size of the fingerlings you are buying.

Chris - MF brings up a very good point. All the wholesalers deduct 2kg for every 50kg of fish they buy. So when they are halling them out of the net and weighing them, each "bucket" contains 52kg of fish and you get paid for 50kg. Water, water, water. Boy was I suprised the first sale we made. My comment was that we never deduct for water when we buy fish at the market. Anyway, that's the way it is.

rgds

[Chris.B]

B395 per bag is very high. I buy feed #2, 30% protein, at just under B18/kg and around 300+ bags per month. When the rains stop I will give a go at making our own feed. I figure the cost will drop to somewhere around B12/kg for material only.

The 395 baht was for food for the fingerlings. My step son now says he is buying larger fish food at 325baht per 20kg bag. This works out at 16.25 baht per kilo which sounds better.

[Chris.B]

4. A typical stocking desnity for prawns would be ~20-25/m^2 with aeration and netting compared to the Thai Fisheries Dept number of 40-125 for catfish.

erm... I just calculated we are stocking at approx. 500 fish per square metre. We are also not oxygenating but changing the water frequently.

.... well I did say it is an experiment.

Edited October 25, 2006 by Chris.B

[Chris.B]

[Pondlife - last year I was given 2000 juveniles, ~PL15, from the Dept of Fisheries in Tak. They sell them for B0.15 each. For some reason the Dept head just gave them to us. Unfortunately, that guy has been transferred down south, I think Narathiwat, and the new folks are not to responsive, at least over the phone. They have a large hatchery operation with the main purpose of stocking PL in the rivers. They also sell PL to the public by the millions.

What is PL?

[Chris.B]

Some good information and tips there guys, thanks Ian, Somtham and Maizfarmer.

When the guy came to our house with the fish he had 4 wooden boxes full of fish in his pickup. Jokingly I asked my wife to ask him how do I know there are 2000 fingerlings in a box. Then I forgot about it. He then proceeded to scoop the fish from the box into the tanks with a plastic bowl. I thought this was the way a "pro" puts fish into a tank. I continued to watch him until he stopped when there was about 50 fish left and said there you are that is 2000! I hadn't realised he was counting them in front of me! He then showed me the remainder of the fish and said "free!"

Now I don't know whether I got 8000 fish in total or not, maybe I did or maybe I did not but he did make an attempt to convince me.

My stepson says he has only used 12 bags so far, this is a bag a week since we got the fish 3 months ago.

Hopefully I will be back in Thailand next month and all will be revealed! Tim/Somtham ... I am convinced the nightlight idea is a good one and will try that out when I get back...thanks.

Edited October 25, 2006 by Chris.B

[Tim207]

I came across a study that might interest catfish farmers. The asia Institute of Technology in Pathumtani did an experiment in which they reused the waste water from catfish tanks to supply tanks with nile talapia. The talapia receieved no food other than nutrients present in the catfish waste water. With proper care this seems to be viable. There were problems with one experimental procedure but their conclusion was:

"If these two species could

be cultured in the integrated systems with appropriate stocking ratio, nutrients released to the

environments could be reduced while production cost also largely reduced as no additional

inputs of feed and fertilizers is required for Nile tilapia culture.

The present experiment demonstrated that Nile tilapia can be cultured in an integrated

recycling system to recover nutrients from wastewater, and suggested that the ratio of hybrid

catfish to Nile tilapia can be lowered through either reducing the stocking density of hybrid

catfish or increasing culture area for Nile tilapia in order to allow Nile tilapia to reuse more

nutrients contained in hybrid catfish wastewater. The integrated recycling system is

technically feasible, environmentally friendly and economically profitable."

http://ag.arizona.edu/azaqua/ista/ista6/ista6web/pdf/755.pdf

[Somtham]

-->

QUOTE(Chris.B @ 2006-10-26 03:42:26) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

B395 per bag is very high. I buy feed #2, 30% protein, at just under B18/kg and around 300+ bags per month. When the rains stop I will give a go at making our own feed. I figure the cost will drop to somewhere around B12/kg for material only.

The 395 baht was for food for the fingerlings. My step son now says he is buying larger fish food at 325baht per 20kg bag. This works out at 16.25 baht per kilo which sounds better.

The B325 price is for feed#3 which contains 25% protein caompared to #2 at 30%. All the studies I have read say 25% protein is enough for the last month but when I've tried it the water gets poluted much faster and have abandoned the practice. Once the fry are wheened (sp?) from teh prawn and frog food we feed #1 for about 1 month and then growout with #2.

erm... I just calculated we are stocking at approx. 500 fish per square metre. We are also not oxygenating but changing the water frequently.

.... well I did say it is an experiment.

533/m^2 in a dirt pond is huge. In a concrete pond it is unimaginable. I am very interested in how this works out for you. The catfish definately prefer dirt ponds over concrete. The concrete pond water gets dirty faster and the fish seem more prone to disease. We just transferred fish earlier this week from the concrete to the dirt ponds and I was having to do a complete water change in the concrete pond every 2 days!

[Somtham]

-->

QUOTE(Chris.B @ 2006-10-26 04:34:01) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

My stepson says he has only used 12 bags so far, this is a bag a week since we got the fish 3 months ago.

Hopefully I will be back in Thailand next month and all will be revealed! Tim/Somtham ... I am convinced the nightlight idea is a good one and will try that out when I get back...thanks.

Ok, 12 bags so far. 12 bags times 20kg per bag = 240kg of feed fed. For now, just use an approximation of 1.5 for a FCR. So your fish have gained weight of 240kg divided by 1.5 = 160kg. add that to the original weight of the fish say maybe 20g each (just guessing here) and you have 160+(8000*.02) = 320kg of fish in your ponds.

The light works good. I have lights above 6 of our ponds and when the bugs are out in force the lights go on and the fishies eat for free....buffet style.

PL stands for Post Larvae. Fresh water prawns, Macrobrachium Rosenbergii, are hatched in salt water and go through a larvae phase of ~30 days at which time the water is slowly converted from salt to fresh water. They are now PL and the PL age is usually stated in days. ie. PL15 are Post Larvae prawns that are 15 days old. Hope this helps.

rgds

[Somtham]

I came across a study that might interest catfish farmers. The asia Institute of Technology in Pathumtani did an experiment in which they reused the waste water from catfish tanks to supply tanks with nile talapia. The talapia receieved no food other than nutrients present in the catfish waste water. With proper care this seems to be viable. There were problems with one experimental procedure but their conclusion was:

"If these two species could

be cultured in the integrated systems with appropriate stocking ratio, nutrients released to the

environments could be reduced while production cost also largely reduced as no additional

inputs of feed and fertilizers is required for Nile tilapia culture.

The present experiment demonstrated that Nile tilapia can be cultured in an integrated

recycling system to recover nutrients from wastewater, and suggested that the ratio of hybrid

catfish to Nile tilapia can be lowered through either reducing the stocking density of hybrid

catfish or increasing culture area for Nile tilapia in order to allow Nile tilapia to reuse more

nutrients contained in hybrid catfish wastewater. The integrated recycling system is

technically feasible, environmentally friendly and economically profitable."

http://ag.arizona.edu/azaqua/ista/ista6/ista6web/pdf/755.pdf

Haven't read the study but I will. All of our ponds drain to a single settling pond. I have stocked that pond with catfish, pla suwai, pla nin, pla thap thim, and soon will be adding some pla jeramet. We don't feed the fish in this pond at all. They only get waste water from the other ponds. This pond is where I relax at the end of the day with a cold Chang and occassionally a fishing rod. I have pulled out catfish that weigh more than 4kg!!

[supersomchai]

On the subject of fish tanks(cement or earth ponds) a thai relative told me cement tanks have to be finished/treated some how otherwise you you end up with a significant number of dead fish in your tank.Anyone heard of this????Failing this, what is the accepted way to build a cement tank?Anyone have a link or plan that is usefull?

[Pond Life]

Somtam- Sorry forgot to thankyou for the Tak fisheries dept tip for GFWP.

I looked up the Thai Fisheries Dept on the web but there didnt seem to be any useful info in English, do you know if the their contact details are in the Thai version, if so no problem I can ask my TGF to look at it when I get back to LOS.

Interesting link about the water recirculation between Catfish & Talapia, I seem to remember from reading the Fresh Water Prawn manual that Prawns do well when mixed with Talapia, could be an added bonus to the recirculation idea ?.

It has been mentioned a few times about the polution problems associated with intensive fish farming, what is the main problem with the waste water, is it just the volume thats the problem or the type of nutrients in the water ? Would this water be suitable for crop irrigation ? presumeing you have a suitable crop area to match the volume of water.

[Pond Life]

Supersomchai - I dont know specifly about concrete fish tanks, but fresh water storage tanks are often sealed with Epoxy paint as it is safe for potable water & prevents leaching of lime etc from the concrete, quite expensive though.

[btate]

I came across a study that might interest catfish farmers. The asia Institute of Technology in Pathumtani did an experiment in which they reused the waste water from catfish tanks to supply tanks with nile talapia. The talapia receieved no food other than nutrients present in the catfish waste water. With proper care this seems to be viable. There were problems with one experimental procedure but their conclusion was:

"If these two species could

be cultured in the integrated systems with appropriate stocking ratio, nutrients released to the

environments could be reduced while production cost also largely reduced as no additional

inputs of feed and fertilizers is required for Nile tilapia culture.

The present experiment demonstrated that Nile tilapia can be cultured in an integrated

recycling system to recover nutrients from wastewater, and suggested that the ratio of hybrid

catfish to Nile tilapia can be lowered through either reducing the stocking density of hybrid

catfish or increasing culture area for Nile tilapia in order to allow Nile tilapia to reuse more

nutrients contained in hybrid catfish wastewater. The integrated recycling system is

technically feasible, environmentally friendly and economically profitable."

http://ag.arizona.edu/azaqua/ista/ista6/ista6web/pdf/755.pdf

Haven't read the study but I will. All of our ponds drain to a single settling pond. I have stocked that pond with catfish, pla suwai, pla nin, pla thap thim, and soon will be adding some pla jeramet. We don't feed the fish in this pond at all. They only get waste water from the other ponds. This pond is where I relax at the end of the day with a cold Chang and occassionally a fishing rod. I have pulled out catfish that weigh more than 4kg!!

This is probably not effective for catfish, but it does work for Talapia. While visiting the Special School in Phuket, I noted they raised chickens for egg consumption and sale ( 50/50). The chicken pens were directly over the fish tank. The droppings from the chickens fed the Talapia. No other food was inserted at all. Between the eggs and fish the school, with 600 special ed students reduce food costs substantially.

With a garden, a few chickens and some Talapia you have a fairly rounded diet.

[Somtham]

PL - we're travelling now and don't have the phone number handy. You can call TOT information telephone number 1133 or 1113 and ask for the Tak Inland Fisheries Department.

Tilapia are not supposed to eat prawns but I would give the prawns a head start so they're big enough before planting the Tilapia in the same pond.

When we started rebuilding our farm we brougt in the local water department folks to survey the land and help lay out the ponds and drainage to the klong. The head guys because concern was the BOD of the solid waste from the prawns. I think this along with nitrates and nitrites are the pollutant issues. We do use the waste water to water a 1 rai garden of chiles and makuas.

Chickens above the ponds are a great way to save money on feed. FAO recommends ~10 birds/100 sq m. I've thought about doing it many times but KPP is one of 4 provinces that are hot spots for the bird flu and my life is worth more than a few baht. Maybe I'm paranoid and would like to hear what others think about this.

rgds

[Pond Life]

Does the garden do well with the waste water ?

[Somtham]

Does the garden do well with the waste water ?

I swear it started raining the day I finished putting in the sprinklers and hasn't stopped until this past week. The only thing that grew well with all the rain was the corn and weeds. We replanted chiles and makua and just started regularly using the pond water this week. I'll let you know how it goes in a month or so.

rgds

[Pond Life]

Ah, so if you're using sprinklers I'm guessing you're filtering out the solids ?

I was thinking all that fish poo would make good fertiliser !

Looking forward to hearing the results.

[meatgrowler]

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QUOTE(Chris.B @ 2006-10-07 22:49:58) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Aprroximately 11 weeks ago my wife and I had two concrete tanks constructed in the back garden of our home in Nakhon Sawan province. Each tank has the following dimensions:- 3m long x 2.5m wide x 1m high. We filled these tanks with water from a well we already had in our garden. In to each tank we put 4000 catfish 'fingerlings'. That is 8000 catfish total! Cost of the catfish where 0.8 baht/fingerling for 6000 fingerlings and 0.75 baht/fingerlings for the final 2000 fingerlings.

We are feeding the fish with approximately 20 kg of fish food a week which costs about 395 baht/20 kg bag. We change the water regular and use 'medicine' when necessary. Even though we are using water from the well on a few occasions we had to use 'bubba', i.e. water from the Water Company supply, this appeared to have no ill effects.

Now 11 weeks on and the fish appear to be growing well but some are growing faster than others. We are now moving onto the next stage which is finding buyers for the fish.

This shows our concrete tanks with sunshade erected over, also to keep out debris.

Inside the tanks.

This picture shows our well.

Concrete rings intended to grow fry into fingerlings but being used as a 'hospital' for fish.

what great topic,i breed a few koi back here in the uk,so this is definately something id consider doing,when i do eventually move to thailand,mainly as a hobby at first then maybe to earn a little baht....

[Somtham]

Ah, so if you're using sprinklers I'm guessing you're filtering out the solids ?

I was thinking all that fish poo would make good fertiliser !

Looking forward to hearing the results.

No filters on the system but I have the pump inlet about 2 feet below the surface of the pond so not to much "poo" is being pumped. The sprinkler heads need occassional cleaning. When we drain a main pond to harvest the fish there is quite a bit of solids that remain in the pond. I use a sludge pump to pump this fertilizer directly to the garden, bypassing the settling pond. Not sure exactly what the fertizer benefits of the poo are but we'll wait and see as we're not using any other fertilizers.

rgds

[supersomchai]

Fish feed prices are the most important thing to getting it right.I have found 20kg fish feed at 260 baht a bag(thai prices at the local shop in sukothai)specifically suited for small fish.As iam starting to grow taptim fish..much bigger than catfish..this is the feed the shop owner recommended.Why is everyone quoting higher prices for feed???

[importford]

Fish feed prices are the most important thing to getting it right.I have found 20kg fish feed at 260 baht a bag(thai prices at the local shop in sukothai)specifically suited for small fish.As iam starting to grow taptim fish..much bigger than catfish..this is the feed the shop owner recommended.Why is everyone quoting higher prices for feed???

My friend had a big fish farm in Phimai.

He bought the left-overs from a big industrial chicken factory.

The price was 24 baht/kg of minced chicken meat and bones.

The catfish love the raw meat and bones. They grow like hel_l!!!!!