Rear fish with 65 by 20 metre bore

[johnfisher]

As the title suggests I have a bore designed for storing water. I considered making use of this either as a separate earner or to feed from . The problem after reading through many old posts is the depth. The bore slopes inwards to the bed which is three metres deep. The bed surface area I would guess is 55 by 14/15. I am not quite sure what to do because many posts suggest the depth to be a problem for pla nin and prawns (which would of been my favoured combo). Does anyone have any sensible workarounds for the 3m depth in relation to that combo? I'm not particularly interested in spending a fortune on it although no problem if the payback is reasonable.

 

Rgds

John 

[CLW]

Using net cages?

[whatawonderfulday]

I have a pond 80 metres by 25 metres with around 35 degree slope all round.  When we bought the land there was an old pond there so I actually had it excavated from a mean 1.8 -  2 meter depth or so to 4 meters deep.  I would have like to gone deeper but was told I would need a mining license to extract further down.   The reason is that the water table in the worst drought conditions is around 1.8 meters below ground surface so hence I now have around 2m meters of water in worst case, of course increasing to around 4 in the rainy season.  I have Pla Nim which I allow to naturally breed and I catch them for my own sport by rod and line. Of course.  I introduced a load of water plants to maintain the water quality ( and to deter the locals who either can only use nets or else can not be bothered with rod and line and playing fish through/around the plants.) and these carry on year in year out

 

Works well for me over the years and no need to worry about the water depth because a)  fish only feed at their instinctive depth, b) plants providing shading and security and most importantly c)  fish are very good swimmers so would not drown themselves at that depth !! 

 

 

[Jotham79]

You will have no problems with the depth.  I have had 3 ponds that deep and no problems.  recruitment can be an issue so you will need some predator fish.

[johnfisher]

@whatawonderfulday - thanks for the insight, given the large amount of technical I have read through from "commercial" users it eases my worry and your method is exactly the same as I had planned (to improve water quality for the fish via planting). 

 

@Jotham79 - thanks for your input, although I don't understand the term recruitment, I presume we would be talking along the lines of the offspring needing to be kept to a minimum. Would you recommend pla schon or catfish for this? Please feel free to correct me if I have misunderstood and do you think I ought to be concerned with a lack of oxygen if I were to go with prawn, they are pretty tasty after all!

 

@CLW a local recommended to me that I should consider rearing all fish inside nets for purpose of easy removal when the time comes. I had an issue with that. For example pla nin I am pretty sure they will supplement their diets on the plants I provide and therefore I would remove that possibility and force them to feed on what pellet I provide. Could you please provide me any information to the contrary, if it is the case. Also it is possible I am overthinking the process and in fact the algae (the main food source), they can eat in nets anyway?

 

Thanks for the responses.

 

Rgds

John