Our Fish Farming Experiment....

[Somtham]

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!!!!!

SSC - Check the contents on the feed bag and I think you'll find out the protein, mineral, and vitamin content is less than that on the catfish feed and the feed you are using is a supplemental feed as opposed to a complete diet. Are you growing your fish in a pond or cages in the river? I am continuously told by the locals that they cannot be grown in a pond unless you have continuously flowing water (translated....expensive).

Importford - Are you sure on the B24/kg? From all I've read chicken remnants usually yield a FCR in excess of 2 or 3. At B24 that becomes very expensive feed, >B48/kg of added fish weight. Around KPP it is selling for B8/kg.

rgds

[RamdomChances]

^ Yes 13 bhat a kg is really cheap for fish food I've never seen it for that, good price if it's comparable with other foods.

I am continuously told by the locals that they cannot be grown in a pond unless you have continuously flowing water (translated....expensive).

I've been told that as well, I don't think it's a case of "can not" rather they do better in flowing water. Anyone got any ideas as to why ? mabye oxegen content ?

Are you sure on the B24/kg? From all I've read chicken remnants usually yield a FCR in excess of 2 or 3. At B24 that becomes very expensive feed, >B48/kg of added fish weight. Around KPP it is selling for B8/kg.

That sound low for a FCR (Food conversion ratio) does it depend on the type of fish. A lot of the large chicken farms do Pla Chon as they are fully carniverous, to get the best from chichen you need an industrial mincer and mice the lot up...bones feathers ect

[turnpike]

if you,ve got the stomache for it, google "maggottry fish food", you'll find a link to a place in Benin (west africa) song hai experience i think its under.

haven't done it yet on that sort of scale, but maggots make excellent food for fish and chickens.

now, i haven't found any info on this, but wouldn't pigs eat maggots as well?

47 % protien if i remember correctly, dry weight is about 1/4 of live weight.

if you could farm a couple hundred kilos a day of live maggots you could feed a sh*tload of fish chickens, and pigs.

i actually find that exciting, i only have one pond, 20m by 20, by 8 m deep, but i plan (one day) to have about 20 ponds, once the wall is done, house is done, money earned etc. etc.

now you guys can get started, and by the time i'm ready to go with this, you'll have it all figured out.

good luck to us all,

turnpike

[chownah]

An 8 metre deep pond! I haven't been reading every post here so excuse me if this has been covered.....what is the recommended depth for a fish growing pond (fish for food)...probably depends on kind of fish I guess. I'm asking because when I had a man come and dig my pond with a backhoe he suggested that if it was too deep it wouldn't be good for the fish....his idea was that over 2 metres was too much and his idea was that 1.5 metres was about right.

Chownah

[Crushdepth]

his idea was that over 2 metres was too much and his idea was that 1.5 metres was about right.

He's right - 1.5 is a good manageable depth for a fishpond. The problem with deep ponds is that you get stratification of the water - the bottom layers can become oxygen depleted if there isn't enough mixing.

[turnpike]

An 8 metre deep pond!

well, the missus dug the pond (with a large excavater, not by shovel) while i was working, but not knowing any better, i would have done the same. it's right full now , only dug it last year, will be interesting to see how far it drops between now and the next rainy season.

i might be a bit off on my thai here, if i was home i'd ask the missus, but the pla duk are thriving, the plachon are thriving and multiplying, not sure of tis one, terraplin??, big silvery fish, anyways, they are thriving, only the pla nin refuse to grow. i'm thinking of trying to net a few, chop them up and refeeding them to the other fish (anyone ever tried that?). i've since been told that pla nin do better in shallow water, they aren't dying or anything, just eating but not getting any bigger. (sounds stupid, but hey, i'm new at this)

when i make my million and build my 20 fish ponds, i won't go quite so deep.

turnpike

[turnpike]

He's right - 1.5 is a good manageable depth for a fishpond. The problem with deep ponds is that you get stratification of the water - the bottom layers can become oxygen depleted if there isn't enough mixing.

you're likely right on that, i did try circulating bottom to top with a small centrifugal pump a few months back, and the water coming out smelt pretty rank, but , as i said earlier, fish seem to be doing okay, and they taste okay. unless i start having fish die off, i don't plan to aerate or circulate, but it likely wouldn't hurt i guess.

turnpike

[Crushdepth]

but the pla duk are thriving, the plachon are thriving and multiplying, not sure of tis one, terraplin??, big silvery fish, anyways, they are thriving, only the pla nin refuse to grow. i'm thinking of trying to net a few, chop them up and refeeding them to the other fish (anyone ever tried that?).

Pla duk can breathe air from the surface, so they should be ok. Plan nin are notorious for rampant overbreeding followed by stunting when their food supplies become limiting due to over population. If you seem to have zillions of small pla nin you could try thinning them out periodically and/or offering some supplemtary feed such as rice bran.

I do have an article somewhere about a farm (in Nepal) that was growing plan nin in cages within ponds. Stunted 'wild' individuals living freely in the actual pond itself were harvested and turned into fishmeal to make feeds for the next crop.

[turnpike]

Pla duk can breathe air from the surface, so they should be ok. Plan nin are notorious for rampant overbreeding followed by stunting when their food supplies become limiting due to over population. If you seem to have zillions of small pla nin you could try thinning them out periodically and/or offering some supplemtary feed such as rice bran.

I do have an article somewhere about a farm (in Nepal) that was growing plan nin in cages within ponds. Stunted 'wild' individuals living freely in the actual pond itself were harvested and turned into fishmeal to make feeds for the next crop.

thanks for that, crushdepth (you must have been a submariner for sure).

i'm pretty sure the fry i've seen in my pond are pla chon, just by the shape, they seem to hang out near the shore.

if there are pla nin fry in there, maybe they hide out deeper, but i don't think they are breeding. i would have seen some extra small ones feeding. i might be wrong, i'll see the pond again in 6 days and should possibly confirm. have seen the pla nin gulping air, that's for certain, especially an hour or two after feeding

speaking about "gulping for air", it's kind've like this forum, trying to learn as much as i can about the topic. thanks to all who have contributed.

turnpike

[Chris.B]

if there are pla nin fry in there, maybe they hide out deeper, but i don't think they are breeding. i would have seen some extra small ones feeding. i might be wrong, i'll see the pond again in 6 days and should possibly confirm.

If you have Pla Chon (Snakehead fish) in there I don't think you are going to see any other fry or small fish.

Whereabouts is your pond?

Edited November 8, 2006 by Chris.B

[Maizefarmer]

his idea was that over 2 metres was too much and his idea was that 1.5 metres was about right.

He's right - 1.5 is a good manageable depth for a fishpond. The problem with deep ponds is that you get stratification of the water - the bottom layers can become oxygen depleted if there isn't enough mixing.

While I know sweet nothing about keeping fish but I do know a bit about carbon dioxide/oxygen exchange in water.

Air pumps which introduce air to tanks through a stone placed on the bottom of a tank are very inefficent as the carbon dioxide has to "exhaust" from the water before the oxygen is absorbed.

In reality very little exchange takes place untill the air bubble reaches the surface.

Surface movement of the water in any given size of tank is by far the most efficient way of promoting gaseous exchange in any volume of water. While I dont know off-hand how much surface movement is required per volume of water, what I can say is that it is far less than what most people feel it needs to to be.

In practise an aquarium type side/glass mounted water pump of around 25 - 50 watt running constantly would be provide as much surface movement as would be needed to sustain all the carbon dioxide/oxygen exchange that a 5cubic/m tank with a 3m/sq surface would be able to exchange through such a surface area.

There is a relationship between the surface area of a body of water, the temp of that water and the temp of the atmosphere above it, that determines the CO2/O2 exchange rate - immaterail of the amount of fish in that volume of water.

A combination of fish movement, surface movement generated by the pump, and the natural tendency of a volume of water to maintain gaseous equilibrium in that volume, is usualy sufficient to maintain balanced distribution of O2 without having to resort to extra means to generate below surface movement of the water.

I would think the factor in the equation as far as all this goes in Thailand, would be water temp. As temp rises so saturation drops - and can drop quite significant. The problem is that theoretical CO2/O2 exchange rate does not change in line with temp, unless the surface area through the exchange can take place is increased - further reinforcing the argument that the most efficient way to stimlutae CO2/Os exchange in water is to maintain as much surface area as possible.

Surface movement is also the most efficient method of reducing the temp of any given volume of water.

While the exchange rate will be restricted for any given volume/surface to some emperical formula (i.e. it can be calculated - I don;t know what it is off-hand), suggesting limited benefit in exchange rates for any given increase in surface movement, the drop in temperature and therefore the increase in overall saturation will will improve significantly with additional surface movement.

IN summary: surface movement is the best (read as: most efficient) way to maintain temp, CO2/O2 exchange and max saturation.

Thats my bit on the subject for what it's worth .........

Tim

Edited November 8, 2006 by Maizefarmer

[lannarebirth]

While I was looking for Dr. Naam's pump diagram I stumbled upon this:

http://www.fao.org/docrep/T4470E/t4470e0l.htm

[Maizefarmer]

Some very interesting ideas there.

I tell you what passing air bubbles through water is very good at - and that is clearing the water of fine particals of dirt and protien waste: they stick to the edge of the bubble and get dragged to the surface where water or air movement tends to blow or drift them all to one or other end of the tank.

Tim

[turnpike]

If you have Pla Chon (Snakehead fish) in there I don't think you are going to see any other fry or small fish.

Whereabouts is your pond?

wasn't aware pla chon were a predatorial fish. thanks for the info.

pond is in isaan, about halfway between khon kaen and udon thani.

[Gary A]

A good friend of mine has a pond of approximately two rai. It wasn't built to raise fish but was built for scenic effect and to provide guests to his rental villa a place to fish. He stocked it with pla nin and pla tabtim. He fed them with commercial fish food for a few months to get them off to a good start and no longer feeds them regularly. The pond is probably about ten years old. I go there to fish once in a while and I have no idea what the fish population is. Yesterday I caught one pla nin that went three and a half kilo and one quite small one. I caught about ten pla tabtim ranging in weight from about a kilo to maybe two kilos. When he stocked the pond he put in twice as many pla nin as pla tabtim. I don't know if the pla nin are harder to catch or if the pla tabtim have taken over. I was using raw shrimp for bait.

My wife was quite impressed with the pla nin but turned her nose up at the pla tabtim. We kept two of the pla tabtim and the one large pla nin. Both her and I are now once more excited with building a pond. My friends pond was originally three meters deep in the center but now only about two meters.

How successful would a three quarter rai pond be? If I put in a pond of that size, could I expect pla nin to do well? Unfortunately we have no more room than that near our house..

[Amir]

-->

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.

Hey Chris

I didn't read all the replies to you post so maybe you answered my question already: What kind of cat fish is it: The vietnameese Ca Basa (pangasius hypophtalmus or Boccurti).

I would be happy to give you advice, i am aquaculture ingeneer and used to be fish and shrimp farm manager (still now).

Let me know if you have any questions...

If you have concrete tanks, you could rear Tilapia, which has a better money value and growth without problem in concrete tanks if you have enough aeretion.

herewith a link to a simulation of a Tilapia farm:

http://www.nefisco.org/software.htm

You have to register to download it, it is free.

[turnpike]

http://www.ias.unu.edu/proceedings/icibs/i...nghai/index.htm

here's the link to the maggot ranch in benin, west africa.

never got any feedback on that one. so maybe i'll try another idea i just dreamt up at work last night, but i might have seen it on animal planet or discovery channel, entimologists catching insects or something along those lines.

lets say you rigged up a vacuum ( a shop vac with a large canister would be ideal) beside a flouroescent light at night time, widened the suction hose at the end (e.g., stick a funnel in it), and put it on some sort of timer to kick in say 1 minute every 10 minutes or so. so for 1 minute in 10 it's sucking up free fish food, maybe a bucket or two a night if it was set up right. if you had multiple vacs rigged up, could could maybe make more than you could use. again, excess bugs could be fed to chickens, or to the in-laws.

a couple of questions.

what light would work best, flourescent, halogen, any color that bugs prefer ( i think they hate yellow), or is a light just a light?

if there's any electricians out there, is it possible to rig up a timer with that sort of schedule?

anybody know of an attractant one could put beside the light to attract more insects at night?

my main goal is to raise healthy fast growing fish with a minimum of $$ spent.

any input always appreciated.

thanks,

turnpike

[chownah]

http://www.ias.unu.edu/proceedings/icibs/i...nghai/index.htm

here's the link to the maggot ranch in benin, west africa.

never got any feedback on that one. so maybe i'll try another idea i just dreamt up at work last night, but i might have seen it on animal planet or discovery channel, entimologists catching insects or something along those lines.

lets say you rigged up a vacuum ( a shop vac with a large canister would be ideal) beside a flouroescent light at night time, widened the suction hose at the end (e.g., stick a funnel in it), and put it on some sort of timer to kick in say 1 minute every 10 minutes or so. so for 1 minute in 10 it's sucking up free fish food, maybe a bucket or two a night if it was set up right. if you had multiple vacs rigged up, could could maybe make more than you could use. again, excess bugs could be fed to chickens, or to the in-laws.

a couple of questions.

what light would work best, flourescent, halogen, any color that bugs prefer ( i think they hate yellow), or is a light just a light?

if there's any electricians out there, is it possible to rig up a timer with that sort of schedule?

anybody know of an attractant one could put beside the light to attract more insects at night?

my main goal is to raise healthy fast growing fish with a minimum of $$ spent.

any input always appreciated.

thanks,

turnpike

From what I understand there are varieties of fish that eat vegetable material. If there is an irrigation canal near you that has alot of weeds growing along its length you can be almost sure that alot of these plants would make good food for fish...my guess is that almost any legume would make good fish food. I took a native legume plant around here and threw some into my wife's fish pond and they seemed to like it. This plant had lots of very small leaves so it was probably easy for them to eat.....if I had a legume with larger leaves I might try shredding them.

Free fish food.

Chownah

P.S. ONe of our neighbors raises pla nin and feeds them shredded cabbage when its available cheap. You could grow cabbage, or soybeans for that matter.....raising your own plants for fish food doesn't cost much especially if you do it organically and have a source for manure.

Chownah

[Tim207]

lets say you rigged up a vacuum ( a shop vac with a large canister would be ideal) beside a flouroescent light at night time, widened the suction hose at the end (e.g., stick a funnel in it), and put it on some sort of timer to kick in say 1 minute every 10 minutes or so. so for 1 minute in 10 it's sucking up free fish food, maybe a bucket or two a night if it was set up right. if you had multiple vacs rigged up, could could maybe make more than you could use. again, excess bugs could be fed to chickens, or to the in-laws.

I don't see this as being very effective but I will answer some of your questions.

a couple of questions.

what light would work best, flourescent, halogen, any color that bugs prefer ( i think they hate yellow), or is a light just a light?

I visited a farm years ago where they put a tub of water with a ultra violet light next to it in the field behind the house. In the morning the grasshoppers were scooped out and fried. A regular washtub yielded about a liter of grasshoppers over night.

if there's any electricians out there, is it possible to rig up a timer with that sort of schedule?

You can find this in any hardware store in the US so I imagine they would be available in Thailand. Well maybe not 1 min in 10 but simple mechanical timers (I even have one sitting in a drawer here now). There should be digital programmable timer swithches available on the net that could do what you want.

I don't think this will yield enough to make your effort worth while. A light over the pond to give some supplemental feeding maybe but as a sole food source I am sceptical.

[Chris.B]

Hey Chris

I didn't read all the replies to you post so maybe you answered my question already: What kind of cat fish is it: The vietnameese Ca Basa (pangasius hypophtalmus or Boccurti).

I would be happy to give you advice, i am aquaculture ingeneer and used to be fish and shrimp farm manager (still now).

Let me know if you have any questions...

If you have concrete tanks, you could rear Tilapia, which has a better money value and growth without problem in concrete tanks if you have enough aeretion.

herewith a link to a simulation of a Tilapia farm:

http://www.nefisco.org/software.htm

You have to register to download it, it is free.

Thanks for the kind offer Amir.

I have absolutely no idea what catfish we have. Good experiment ehh?

[Nawtilus]

Anybody know if they farm Barramundi here in Los, I have seen them in tanks in restaurants, sure it was them, but might have a local name.

http://www2.dpi.qld.gov.au/fishweb/1948.html

[Crushdepth]

Yes its a very commonly farmed fish here and is the same species as oz barramundi. It goes locally by the name 'plah gapong' or Asian seabass. If you are able to get ones that have been grown in seawater they taste heaps better than those grown in freshwater (which are the majority).

[bina]

resucitating a topic;;

any info in thai for fish farming... husband is really into fish of any kind and has this idea, like most thai, for doing somehting to make money. so am looking for good info in thai. he finds stuff on the internet but is not internet savvy and i cant read thai so gets one or two links and thats that. he wants to do more then the usual 'sort of' ponds that people do for a few extra baht. any leads, it will keep him busy for a while. will also read thru this thread and translate the pertinant parts with photos etc. also, does the amphur or changwat have info etc like extension agency for this sort of stuff -- soeng sang, korat.

in mean time here in israel he is learning to keep records, balance and budget imaginary ponds, harvests whatever and not just do like his aunt, throw in some fingerlings and sell off whatever makes it three months later -- when we were at his home we kept our eyes peeled for how other people do these endeavors etc. and has decided to do things 'more scientifically'. so would like to encourage this sort of thinking....

[D-MAX]

i tried fishfarming pladuk for three years

we had 8 ponds of 25 by 35 meters

stocked them with between 25000 to 50000 fingerlings each during these years

fed them the right amount of fishfeed

we never had fish death because of sickness or bad water

other thai fishfarmers out of the area used to visit our farm and make compliments about the health and growing rates of our fish

the fish would be harvested by our wholesaler when the size was about 5 to a kg

we would normaly stock 2 to 3 ponds at a time and leave 1 or 2 ponds with water to be used for adding and waterchanges

we also installed a deepwaterwell at 120 meters for adding water during the dry season

the harvests overal were good

for example: a pond with 40000 fingerlings would yield around 7000 kg fish

in february 2004 i was at the farm while harvesting was going on

it took 3 weeks and 27 tons of pladuk went to the market for between 32 to 38 bath per kg

to cut the story short

we stopped with the operation because of the following reasons:

1- incease of energy prices(diesel aerationpumps)

2-wholesale prices of pladuk fluctuating between 26 and 38 bath per kg(dayprice)

3-breakeven price is around 32 bath

4-when average size of the fish is 5 to a kg you need to harvest

for large size fish is no market and price is 3 bath below the dayprice

5-fishgrowth slow during cold and raining season (fish will not eat)

6-energy price up so the fishfeed prices went up, dayprice not

7- wholesaler not able to harvest when fish is the right size,because of other fishfarms harvesting at the same time and sometimes not able to get rid of the daily catch because of not enough market

8- fish keeps on eating and growing while waiting for the wholesaler( to big, less money)

there are more reasons i'm not able to think of at this moment

we even tried making fishfeed to cut costs but because of the birdflu this was to risky

we also tried the maggots, but thai people dont like maggots and pigshit

so after making some money when prices were good but in the end the average prices were to low to run a good operation i decided to call it quits.

at this moment we are using the fishponds as waterstorage for rice farming

[turnpike]

we even tried making fishfeed to cut costs but because of the birdflu this was to risky

we also tried the maggots, but thai people dont like maggots and pigshit

d-max,

sorry to hear that it didn't work out the way you wanted, a little disheartening to hear as i had hoped i could make some $$ at it someday.

just wondering how you did the maggots? and are you sure thais are "grossed out" by maggots? i would have harboured to guess that you could sell nice clean live maggots (i hadn't planned on it, tho') to the thais for food, as bad as it sounds, but we've all seen them eat similar food.

anyways, thanks for the post. guess i might have to rethink things a bit here.

regards,

turnpike

[RamdomChances]

we even tried making fishfeed to cut costs but because of the birdflu this was to risky

we also tried the maggots, but thai people dont like maggots and pigshit

I know where you went wrong..... the fish that are supposed to eat the maggots and shit not the people

I dabble in fish farming, but the more I look into it the less likely it seems to be able to be done profitabley on a large scale unless you have a cheap readly avalible food source i.e chicken farm.

Food convertion ratios of about 1:1.5 have been quoted which at around 20 bhat Kg for food maens that you have to feed 30 bhats worth of food to increace the weight by 1 kg (Yes I know you can get cheaper but I'm just being general) add to that the cost of the fingerlings, water, electricity, wastage and the margins tend to look very small.

This year I have'nt stocked my pond at all, but it's teaming with fish, mainly Pla Nin, last year I did about 5000 mixed Pla Duk/Pla Nin low stock rate/low feed rate probaly broke even.

I'vew spent 100 bhat on food for the fish this year, but as we have so many and they seem to be doing quite well we've been looking at alternatives, basicaly they now get, waste cow food make it into a powder is best, Chicken food (my BIL delivers the stuff and sweeps his lorry out after usually a couple of Kg a day), stale bread and anything we, the cow's or the dogs don't eat

My biggest expence with it is keeping it toped up with water although I do have my own bore so the cost is a lot lower than Gov water

I estimate there's about 10,000 in there this year if I can sell a pond full a year with minimul outlay I'll be happy and just see it as a bonus

Oh I've added about 50 Pla Chon just to keep the numbers in there managable, I'll eat them myself

[bina]

nice to read updated info.

i am planning a few trips to the fish farms here in israel, and get some info from them..i will report when that happens. after all we are a water shortage country but are, surprisingly enough, on the list of main suppliers of koi etc to other countries in the ornamental fish market, and we do fairly well with carp for food, and the st. peters fish etc... also... but for anon and i my belief is in diversity. enough to feed/clothe etc ourselves et al and not rely on any one thing, on the other hand not to do too many different things and none of them well.

for all u farmers, just picked up a book i had on a shelf-- yes a book, not internet-- called thai agriculture by lindsay falvey-- he has stats in there about goats, fish sheep etc... its outdated and not sure about the stats but it was interesting to read anyway.

bina and anon

[D-MAX]

RandomChances and turnpike

the problem with the maggots was that the people would not like eating fish when it had been fed maggots which have been grown from pigwaste and other kinds of waste

the wholesaler did't like the idea and was afraid of losing costumers

but growing the maggots was easy

we built a smal "maggot ranch" using the drawings from the benin link

it really works!

i will look for some pictures of the fishponds and place them on this site

[bina]

just went thru the tilapia fish thingy... wasnt quite sure what i was supposed to do... but then again, didnt read the user manual of course -typical israeli, never read instructins first...55555-

am copy clipping all the info and translating it all verbally to thai... it helps me learn terminology for things like meter squared, etc...

how do people know what u fed a fish anyhow

nobody checks what our cows ever ate; avocados , rotten oranges, ensiled stuff.... who cares what they eat when someone buys it at a store...

why do people put predator fish in the ponds, to cull out weaks ones or to make them move around a bit or what... i'm asking, no question key sorry.

bina and anon

israel

[RamdomChances]

why do people put predator fish in the ponds, to cull out weaks ones or to make them move around a bit or what... i'm asking, no question key sorry.

Usually they don't I've put some in mine as I only feed at a very low rate and I feels theres to many small fry in there to support. Apart from that Pla CHon is one of my fav eating fish