Tilapia Cleaning - 04/23/21 07:36 PM
I am about to go get some Mozambique Tilapia next week to put in my half acre pond.
It has been a pasture watering hole for years, but has active fish population (catfish, green perch hybrid, and chain pickerel) and seems otherwise no worse for wear past lack of maintenance.
The big problem is a large amount of plant matter, leaves and pine straw as well as living algae PA and FA.
So I have mixed input from research and local pond guys on how effective Tilapia will be.
Some say they will binge and breed till they starve from eating ALL the algae or die of cold. And said they will eat the dead and living matter, preferring the live first.
Some say come end of the season I will not even notice they were there from vegetation control aspect, that drain and start over is the only real option.
Can someone with real experience in this area give me some realistic expectations.
Will I have a hungry army cleaning 24 hours a day, or am I just planning to raise a lot of fish and end up manually cleaning later?
Fish farm says 20# is twice what would be considered normal, should ensure I get a huge amount spawned over a summer, and that I could end up skimming and burying thousands come mid fall.
To grow that many fish, they have to be eating something, and that something is mostly water, so mass wise they would have to consume a LOT.
Question is will the algae grow faster than the fish?
Half acre average dept 5 feet.
Draining is not really an option or at least not a sound one as it would flood my neighbor.
I figure the predators will love it, and they should not be competing for any resource but oxygen.
And it will be at lest a couple more months before I can get power/aeration to the pond.
Before and after photos are proving hard to find.
Thoughts?
It has been a pasture watering hole for years, but has active fish population (catfish, green perch hybrid, and chain pickerel) and seems otherwise no worse for wear past lack of maintenance.
The big problem is a large amount of plant matter, leaves and pine straw as well as living algae PA and FA.
So I have mixed input from research and local pond guys on how effective Tilapia will be.
Some say they will binge and breed till they starve from eating ALL the algae or die of cold. And said they will eat the dead and living matter, preferring the live first.
Some say come end of the season I will not even notice they were there from vegetation control aspect, that drain and start over is the only real option.
Can someone with real experience in this area give me some realistic expectations.
Will I have a hungry army cleaning 24 hours a day, or am I just planning to raise a lot of fish and end up manually cleaning later?
Fish farm says 20# is twice what would be considered normal, should ensure I get a huge amount spawned over a summer, and that I could end up skimming and burying thousands come mid fall.
To grow that many fish, they have to be eating something, and that something is mostly water, so mass wise they would have to consume a LOT.
Question is will the algae grow faster than the fish?
Half acre average dept 5 feet.
Draining is not really an option or at least not a sound one as it would flood my neighbor.
I figure the predators will love it, and they should not be competing for any resource but oxygen.
And it will be at lest a couple more months before I can get power/aeration to the pond.
Before and after photos are proving hard to find.
Thoughts?