Heard of marine fish culture in fresh water? The Marine Products Export Development Authority (MPEDA) has achieved this.
A tonne of seabass fish, purely a marine species, was harvested from fresh water tanks at Aqua Nova farm at Saliyamangalam village near Thanjavur on Thursday.
M.S.Shanmugham, District Collector, saw the harvest and appreciated MPEDA for achieving this.
According to S.Kandan, Assistant Director (Aquaculture) MPEDA, two hectares of fresh water pond belonging to G.S.Samarasam was selected at Saliyamangalam for the purpose.
Around 4000 seabass fingerlings (6 c.m x 3.2 gram weight) produced at Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Aquaculture at Sirkazhi in Nagapattinam were stocked in the 2x2x3.2 meter cages put up in the pond and cultured by giving imported pellet feed. Within eleven months the fingerlings grew to 38 cms size fish with an average weight of 750 grams. "The growth is better than sea water and there is no disease attack", Mr.Kandan said.
The result of this demonstration indicated clearly that even marine fish seabass can be cultured very easily in fresh water especially in lakes, reservoirs, canals, and community ponds.
Fish farmers, who raise fresh water species like catla, rohu and mirgal, saw the harvest and said that they will try seabass culture in their ponds.
"Being an export variety, seabass fish cultured in fresh water can help farmers to get a good income through exports" Kandan said.
The price of a kilo of seabass in domestic market is Rs.220 per kilo. Twenty three cages were put in Saliyamangalam pond and one tonne of fish was harvested from them.
Nearly one hundred and fifty fish farmers saw the harvest and learnt from MPEDA officials about the method of culturing seabass in fresh water on Thursday.
C.J.Sampathkumar, Deputy Director, MPEDA, Meenakshi Sundareswari Annadurai, president of Saliyamngalam Panchayat, Razak Ali, Assistant Director MPEDA, participated.
