Hey all, Happy New Year!
Just another boring update, but I feel like I've abandoned this place as of late!
I've been heavily involved in trying to play catchup to be ready for SMB tank spawning and I'm 30-45 days behind.
I have spent a massive amount of time with our Black Bass experts with the state and once again, what I know about WAE means nothing... :-))
First issue that had to be addressed was tank color-yes, Tank color.. An 11 year study showed the blue tanks to cause higher pheromone levels than any other color tested!! So... why are "most" aquaculture tanks molded in blue?? As it turns out, this changes with the species, who knew??
The challenge has been finding a paint that sticks to polyethylene and is not toxic. That hurdle is crossed-finally.
Filtration was another issue of concern and after expecting to use sand filtration I found that is not really a good thing either with high solids, so... The filter media I settled on is a high-tech, high flow media that does not compact under any circumstances yet clears water very well and supports about 200 times the bacteria that sand/gravel will.
Best case would have been to have all breeders inside in October but due to many roadblocks and shipping issues, I'll be looking at possibly mid January depending on weather.
My filtration system rolls total capacity once ever 2 hrs and goes through 2 UV sterilizers before returning to tanks.
My Water heater is capable of raising temp at a rate of 1 deg per hour and is controlled by digital control pad setting and timer. This should allow a nice 1 deg per day change if required, or 3-4 degs if I want. This has been tested already so I got that much figured out.
Feed tank is 5.5' X 12.5' and 20" deep. I totally redone this fiberglass tank and finished it out with epoxy paint, 2 new belt feeders and 4 divisions for sorting fast/slow growers. Test #1 for feed tank is going to be the hatching tank for YP ribbons placed on spawning mats.
Racks are made to hold 12 spawning mats inside Feed/hatching tank.
The majority of what I'm setting up is for SMB... Yes, it can be used for others but I cannot begin to understand the complexity involved in a multi-species, high reproduction facility..
I went to the trouble of fin clipping for DNA testing and chose to cull 1 fish that didn't line up with my target DNA so I felt pretty darn good about that considering the money spent and after probably close to 45 phone calls throughout the USA, 1 fish farm confirmed they knew what Majority DNA of their stock was and this is a bit different than LMB. There are 4 variations that are recognized in SMB as separate SUB species. My DNA matches closely to that of the world record variant, which means nothing other than potential and the 2 year growth rate is slightly better than the more southern relatives-opposite of what one would think.
All in all, it's been a huge challenge, it's- so far-rewarding and very humbling in realizing how much is yet to be learned about this one species.
Anyone ever comes through this way, I'll sure put ya to work!