Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Creating the food chain Giant Australian redclaw crayfish

No, I am not going to consider stocking them, and I wouldn't even if I lived in a warm enough climate. CJBS2003 might roll over in his future grave at my stocking of non-natives

But, a crayfish that doesn't burrow and gets to be a foot long seems like it could be an awesome addition to a trophy bass forage base! They are grown in the U.S. in some small scale aquaculture set ups for eating, and can be bought for that purpose from a farm in Florida.
http://farmingcrawfish.com/

I actually do think I am going to order some for aquaponic purposes/consumption, once I get settled in my new place.







Juveniles experience high mortalities below 46 degrees.

Looks closer to a lobster than a crawdad to me.

Not just small scale aquaculture. And they are considered small lobster by some.

I have some in my aquaponics set up.

http://aquaponicscommunity.com/forum/topics/red-claw-crayfish

Too cool...anyone aware of their temperature tolerance? Looking for their lethal limit - says 46 is lethal to juveniles.

Tough to say. The study below noted survival of 60 percent over 6 days with a low temperature of 50 deg farenheit.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0044848698002907

Apparently Arizona Fish and Game is worried that survival temperatures in the wild may differ from those in the lab.
http://www.azgfd.gov/h_f/documents/RedClawCrayfishRiskAnalysis.doc

In any case, I have an email out to the Virginia department of game and inland fisheries about what licensing is needed to purchase them, and once I get them, plan on toying around a bit to see what their cold tolerance really looks like.

I'm surprised that noone here seems to have their curiousity piqued as to how the redclaw would do as a forage species for bass. Obviously none of us are going to stock them, but it is an interesting intellectual question.

Isn't it cheaper to use fish to feed your bass? I doubt that such crayfish can survive long enough to reach that foot size length. All these creatures are slow enough to become an easy target for any predator.

Do they live in burrows or not - it doesn't matter. I can tell you about my experience here in Latvia. There's one lake with a lot of crayfish (Astacus leptodastylus) nearby. They usually live in burrows and come out only at night to hunt. Fish should sleep then, shouldn't they? But many caught perch and pikes have got remains of crayfish in their stomachs. Maybe they are caught not as much as if they wouldn't live in burrows but anyway burrows don't save them.
If they lived in burrows all the time then they would be more secure if there is no eel in the lake/river. This fish simply gets in crayfish home and eats it. They love crayfish

It is all about habit and having a lack of predators for the crayfish to hide and reproduce. Bass absolutely destroy crayfish if they are in a pond/lake. Here in Oklahoma, you see mounds of dirt and that is a crayfish home.

Sometimes night fishing is the best.

They would be interesting to toss in a tank and see what happens.

Cool! Thanks for the link. Have you eaten any? How did they taste? What has been the largest size your crayfish have attained?

I raise CrayFish in a 300 gallon stock tank. I started with three, after one year I harvested and ate 30, replacing 150 Juvies, the next year I harvested 35 large ones for eatnig and again replacing 165 babies and juvies to grow out for next year. they actually taste REALLY good.

What do you feed crawfish in a tank?

lots of scraps from the kithen, carrot shavings toatoes etc...
seems like every time we make a salad we have as much waste as we do salad, they eat all that, I toss in dead minnows from time to time, also can fed catfish pellets and rabbit pellets. they can wipe out a half gallon bucket of vegitable cuts in one night. they eat anything fresh and raw. tossed in a brused apple cut in half once. Gone the nest day.......when the water is warm the are machines.......

I've fed various things to crawfish but my biggest problem was that if it was leafy it would float. Do you make it sink?

they just crawl up and grab it from the surface or I stick up under the floating water lettuce and they can get at it quite well

Could you imagine what a thriving population of those could do for the 10+ pound bass in your pond?

It would certainly be interesting. Plus, it would give you the option of having a few crawdads to eat for yourself too!

It sounds like a win win to me.

I'm not a purest. I like to think of ways to innovate...not ways to stay the same.

I am imagining a food chain involving mud puppies, bullfrogs, red claw crawdads, gizzard shad and tilapia. It would look like Land of the Lost. LOL. Every food item would be monstrous LOL.

Can you imagine pulling a 15 pound bass out of your pond, opening it up and finding a one pound crawdad, a foot long salamander, a frog big enough to eat a mouse, and a tilapia that you could have filleted and eaten yourself? LOL. It sounds like a fairytale to some, but I think it sounds beautiful.

This is what happens when you toss a Blue Gill into a 300 gallon stock tank with 100+ juvenile CrayFish......

54-82 F. is the range with 75 F. being optimum-
pH should be between 7.5-8.5
water hardness should be over 100 PPM
D.O. should be over 3 PPM at all times preferably at 6 PPM

If you ate one of these you would never think of feeding one to a bass ever again..............they are that good to eat

Too bad none of you are in northern Indiana. One of our presentations at our aquaculture conference March 2nd in Shipshewana, Indiana will cover redclaws -- in conjunction with an aquaponics system.

Strangely enough, we have a few local lakes with reproducing Australian red claw. They are listed as an invasive species in Alberta. I don't now how they make it through our winters with over 200 days of ice cover and water temps in low 30's. There is only one native species here, northern (verile) and they are limited to a few river systems only in the eastern parts.

Wood,

Are you sure someone isn't giving you bad information? I too can't see how this species could survive in Canada's winters let alone most of the U.S.'s winters. That would be like saying tilapia could survive under the ice.

Maybe you can provide a link on where you got the information?

Hi Cecil, my son caught a few while trout fishing a couple of years ago. I did a bit of a search and found this.
http://www.srd.alberta.ca/FishWildlife/F...Alberta2007.pdf

perhaps they found a couple released ones during the summer,below 50 degress is leathal to red claws...

I believe you but a crayfish that is classified as "tropical" becoming established in Canada? Huh?

I sent an email up your way to see what the scoop is. I hope I get a better response than when I sent a query to Ontario regarding fishing. A guy with an Indian accent (not Native American) said he would send me the information and all I got was a silly fish identification poster!