Fish Farming

[Nebe]

of course b ush backs it. if they go through with that plan, the oil companies wont have to pay to remove them. But hey, if it works and is profitable, more power too them...

I am always the skeptic

[MakoMike]

What bothers me about the whole thing is that it takes 8 pounds of fish meal (for food) to produce one pound of fish. Now where do you think all that fish meal is going to come from?

[Fly Rod]

I seen that some where the other day!!!!

Bad plan!!! It has been proven from other fish farming programs that between the fish meal that does not get consumed and the fish droppings that go to the bottom is not healthy for the area!!!! Creates oxygen depleted areas and spreads alot of disease amongest fish!!!! Case in point is the fish farm off of Maine where hundreds of thousands of pounds of salmon have had to be destroyed!!! Farmed raised fish are better off being raised in concrete pins where they can be scrubbed and disinfected from time to time!!!!!

The place in Maine has gone belly up a couple of times, but seems someone comes along and thinks that they can make it work!!!!

[Raven]

Aquaculture Research Information Sheet: Nutrition Research
One of the main factors limiting the expansion of aquaculture is the development of nutritionally adequate, cost-effective diets. Feed and feeding can contribute up to 70% of total operating costs for fish and prawn farms. The protein source of choice for most aquaculture diets is fishmeal yet this ingredient is only produced in very small quantities in Australia. Global production of fishmeal is static or declining yet demand, especially for aquaculture, is increasing rapidly. This has led to price escalation.

Replacement of fishmeal is a major international research priority. In Australia we have abundant supplies of agricultural proteins, including vegetable and animal meals, and we have been very successful at utilising these ingredients to produce very cheap, cost-effective diets for pigs and poultry. At NSW Fisheries we have now developed high-performance diets without fishmeal for the freshwater native silver perch. Research with snapper is also underway and low fishmeal diets have been successful at a laboratory scale. Collaborative research with other species, eg. barramundi, prawns and salmon has also been successful.

Research is continuing to evaluate and improve alternative ingredients to fishmeal. Some of the most promising ingredients include high protein, low-ash meatmeals, poultry-offal meal, de-hulled lupins and modified wheat gluten products. Oilseeds and other grains are also valuable ingredients. Further processing of some ingredients such as fine grinding and the removal of husks or cooking can increase the use of Australian agricultural ingredients. Defining nutritional requirements is also an important priority. Research in this area on protein requirements at different energy contents has been successfully completed for silver perch and snapper. Work on defining requirements for essential fatty acids has also been completed for silver perch. Requirements must be met for rapid growth and oversupplying essential nutrients is expensive and can increase problems with water quality.

[RIROCKHOUND]

Flyrod; I think part of the reason for using these spots in the open ocean is to eliminate those problems....

MakoMike hit it on the nose... 8lbs of fishmeal = pogies etc..

Bad Idea, support propperly regulated commercial fishing....

[Fly Rod]

And sick, virus contanminated seafarm raised fish that spread the contamination to wild fish either by there feces or escaping and spreading disease = 0 pogies and other wild fish!!!!!!

Now if they are having this problem in the cold waters of Maine and northern Europe, I would think that the problem would be greater in warmer southern waters!!!!

Let's hope I'm wrong about that!!!!
All the scientific data at the moment shows that ocean farming fish is not working!!!!!

They are also farming Giant Bluefin Tuna and they are feeding these fish tons of bait fish!!!! and scientist are worried about the depletion of the bio-mass of bait fish!!!!

They need to find a better way!!!!!

[scoobe]

Did you know that farm raised salmon are more toxic than the wild ones? That's from all the freakin crap in the feed.