CATFISH FINGERLINGS PRODUCTION AND FEEDING SYSTEM

Fingerling Production Culture practices for fingerling production are relatively standardized across the industry, especially when compared to the wide variety of production strategies used to grow food-sized catfish. Fry grow faster when stocked at lower densities but more space is required to grow larger fingerlings at lower densities. Stocking rate is therefore
a compromise between benefits of producing large fingerlings for
foodfish growout and the
economics of producing more small fingerlings in less space. Fish are fed a manufactured feed and
grown to fingerling size (3 to 8 inches long) over a 5 to 10 month
period. Fish are either allowed to
continue growing in their original
nursery ponds or are harvested
and transferred to other ponds for growout to stocker-sized fish of 0.1 to 0.25 pounds or to food-sized fish of 1.2 to 2.5 pounds. It is important to fertilize nursery
ponds so that they contain
abundant natural foods to promote growth until the fry are large enough to switch to manufactured feeds. A finely ground feed should be offered once or twice daily to
train fish to accept the feed. As the fish grow, feed particle size is
increased. A month or so after
stocking, the fish (now called
fingerlings) are fed once or twice daily to satiation, using a small
floating pellet with 32 to 35
percent crude protein. Because fingerling populations are
particularly susceptible to
infectious diseases, disease
management takes on added
importance in this stage of
production. Survival of catfish fry to fingerlings varies greatly from
pond-to-pond depending on the
initial condition of the nursery
pond, losses to bird predation, and the incidence of infectious diseases. Average survival from fry stocking to fingerling harvest in excess of 60 percent across all ponds on the farm is considered to be very good.
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