Breeding fish

[Glyn]

We stocked our dams with silver perch a couple of years ago and are now reaping the benefits. Smoked on the Weber last night for tea - fantastic!
Now a question - probably Vicki can answer.
Silver Perch don't breed in farm dams as the eggs are dense and sink into the un-oxygenated mud. In the wild they need the overflow country where it is shallow and well oxygenated to develop. These fish we are catching now are full of eggs and sperm ( as you land them they shed). So if we milk them and put it in a large bowl what else do we need to do to grow them to fingerlings? It just seems a waste not to be able to restock ourselves.
Glyn

[minnie]

Holy moly Glyn,

I've no idea, we always had the parent fish taking care of the fingerlings.

Have you tried to google it, or contact the fish farms?

Sounds good, I'm thinking the same thing with one of our dams... did you have to run them for a bit in a tank with clean water to clean them out? Or did they have a muddy taste?

Vicki

[Glyn]

No muddy taste straight from the dam , they're actually fairly mildly flavored so a bit of smoking as they're cooked helps .I figured the fish farms are unlikely to want to give away their secrets - that's how they make their money after all selling fingerlings at .80 to $1 each. I'll google it as you say, but if we get these going we can stock your dams too.
Glyn

[minnie]

Sometimes they surprise you, they probably wouldn't see you as competition.

Let us know what you find out.

Vicki

[Heidi]

Hi Glynn,
I'll take a stab at it... if you need to provide shallow oxygenated waters, why not try puting them in a small pond with a pump moving the water around.

In our front yard, we have a three level fish pond, that has a little waterfall between each level, and is kept moving with a normal fish pump (@$50 from Bunnings). Initially we used black plastic as the liner, but then a friend was throwing out a pool liner that we replaced it with.

Maybe you could rig something up like that????
H

[dggoatlover]

Yum that sounds lovely! I thought of stocking our dam as well once we have some spare cash to buy fingerlings. But our dam flooded last week after all the rain we had up here in CQ. My daughter found a heap of fish washed up on the grass about 10-15cms long. Think I am going to have to throw in a line and see what is in there - I might not have to stock it after all!

[Glyn]

My fish eggs didn't hatch - got really smelly though Looks like you need to inject the female with hormones to get them to lay - then put them in a tank with a male for 24 hrs then remove and keep the water aerated and at constant temp - and you need baby fish food. Bit more complicated than my attempt, but not impossible.
Anyone have any Follicle Stimulating Hormone (FSH) going spare?
Glyn

[minnie]

Holy moly Glyn,

That is a bit more complicated... wonder where you'd get the hormone?

Vicki