₦airaland Forum

Ttalk:
My Oga, no be small thing o, it an eye opener, i must confess that it was painfully exciting. Anyway let me discuss my mistakes

MY MISTAKES:
1.Stress: My mistakes started from the construction of my pond, rather than use the conventional outlet with big pipe that will allow water to flow rapidly from the pond thereby reducing the stress period of fish during changing of water, my outlet can take as much as two hours before water is drain from the pump and another 3 hour to pump water into the pump because i used the smallest pipe to run water from the tank to the pond.

2. Seed: Though i bought my fingerling from a reputable farm, yet what i bought was not sorted to guarantee even growth thereby making some fish to grow faster than the other
Also my seed cannot be said to be the first set which some people call shooters

3. Feeding: Rather than start with 1.2-1.5 which contain 56% protein to boost their growth regardless of what they ve be eating from where bought it, I started feeding my fish with 2mm simply because the fish was already eating 2mm from where i bough it.

4. Water Management: From my previous write-up, it was clear to me that there was no magic that would have made my fish attain reasonable weight at 4month

Before, i talk about my success, my Ogas who i believe have once be in my shoe should share with us how they were able to turn things around when they found themselves in this my situation

robonski16:
My chairman firstly i have said it times without number that buying fingerlings/juvenile to melange is not feasible you hatch yourself, stock and sell the rest to buy feed.. more so spending #150 to get an average weight of 350grms after three months is NULL, their average weight should be half a kg that is 500grms, some farmers don't spend up to #150 in raising their melange.

500grms x 5000= 2500kg

2500kg x #400= 1million profit

#150 to raise one fish plus miscellaneous.... #150 x 5000= 750,000

#100,000,000 - #750,000 =#250k (net profit)

If you read my write up on melange i said 5000 to me is the least you can stock and you have to continue a cycle before harvest. you can be harvesting every month.

ab1x:
The length does not really matter in catfish business, what matter most is the weight. A fish that eat regularly (balance diet) weather the feed has maize or not will have weight. Too much maize/koko garri may reduce the amount of feeds they eat. Much a times, they eat the feed and go to the bottom of the water to vomit it thereby polluting the water. Just ensure they eat well and you give them the right local feed formula. In this part of the world that I am, 1.1KG is a small fish.

Tbagwell1:
It bulk sales, funny enough they average weight was btw 800gram - 1kg, those weighing 1.5kg above was sold @ 1200 but it was sold to a joint lady. Their is ds woman I have that usually buys fish from ibadan evey day a bus full of fish come to her place and she sells to d market women. They very big ones #17,250 per basin and each basin contains 25kg Dats like 690 per kg.

dkings101:
Vital feed = uac food
Top feed = flour mill nig plc

Soon dangote would introduce his own feed...this business is gaining ground, respect and exposure.

robonski15:
Always treat your vat before spawning, wash first use salt, formalin, in fact i add a little quantity of iodestiryl in the water with the eggs.. there is a pro bio-tic artemia i saw at an agro store in atlanta which gives the fries resistance to diseases i am planning on trying it soonest.. Abeg carry on my boss i dey enjoy your updates.

www.agricnetwork.com

olubankemi:
oh yes, thank you very much. you guys give me much inspiration.

my fishes are doing well. this is my first.

i have not used Durante and Aqua before but i have used Multi feed.

i have used Zeigler, multi feed, vital and top feed.

Zeighler really gave them a faster growth rate before the guy who feeds my fish start giving them different feeds i never bought or asked for.

multi feed? i cant really say much about it as i dont see any significant change.

Vital and Top feed gave me immense result. my fish size doubled in two/three weeks i used top feed. maybe this result was also because i changed my fish feeder to someone else who feed them regularly and in the right quantity. top feed is sold for 4000 here in lag while vital is 4300.

i experienced minimal mortality. my fishes will be five months in two days. will sell them off soon. some are more than 1kg and some below that.

i will appreciate if you visit ooo. thank you dear.

@kemi,
Each time I see your posts, I feel so so excited.
How are your fish doing? Is this your second breeding?

Can you rank/rate your feeds used so far?

For me, I've used durante, multi and aqua.
Durante is better than aqua which is better than multi.
In my nex breeding, i will stick to aqua cos its cheap and good compared to others.
Durante here is 5600 for 15kg, multi 5000, the aqua I bought is 4600. I don't know if the aqua is that cheap cos of where it was bought. My neighbour and colleague helped me buy it at ihiala. My fish eat the aqua as they eat durante.

My fish will be 4months by month end. I may sell when they finish this bag of feed or may add extra 1month for them.

Johnnyessence:
AFTER FEEDING THEM WITH CHICKEN LIVER IT WILL REDUCE THE PURCHASE OF 6MM FEED I DO FEED THEM WITH MULTI-FEED WITH CHICKEN LIVER.

cross234:
please who knw any store dt I can get digital PH tester in either Lagos, Abeokuta, Ilorin or Ibadan. pls I need it very urgently. thks

atoleybaba:
aquafeed mixed with vita feed.....then d Ziegler we use the highest mm..

atoleybaba:
In ikd...1kg goes for 480naira d least a farmer can go....my dad uses aqua feed from 2months(it gives them big shape or makes them fat) then 3days to harvest, he uses ziegler.(damn that feed normally works wonder as it gives d fish mad weight strong and sturborn) the buyers are always asking my dad's manager that " Isaac shey u dy give DX ur fish ogogoro" another thing that works for DX biz is that buyers loves long fish with big heads. Then another thing I noticed is that u make ur complete money if ur fish weigh 1-2kg....the 2kg(big fish) buyers normally clear ur pond. I think d biz is interesting Buh u must be ready to make sacrifices Buh physically and materially....and op I must say for d past 4years my dad has been in dx biz we av not come across any juju buy Buh we av seen many dubious ones. Is either dy claim ur weight is not good or wheen dy find out u are not paying attention to them they steal fish. My own advise is if u know u are a young guy and u can't go thrru d financial stress of monitoring fish to 6 months d best thing u should do is learn how to hatch and sell fingerlings...I swear there is money there. And I also agree with d op. The best way to make ur money is by hatching urself ooo. In fact u will only run into lost if u are careless with ur handling of d fish. There ntn as good as hatching ur fish urself

BELEXYFARMS:
It is NOT easy at all... You need to gradually build your customer base. Sometimes the fishes will stay on d farm beyond the time u av stipulated for harvesting and d farmer will now panick and sell at a give away price. Happens a lot to newbies. Start doing ur market survey now. Walk around ur area and check for major markets and see if there are catfish sellers there. If u av lots of peppersoup joints around u, start telling dem dat in a few months time u will av catfish for sale.
By the way, where is ur location? It would be nice if u can hook up wt other farmers around u. They will share the contacts of buyers wt u if dey are nice guys.

Tbagwell1:
1. Buy ur own scale, it not more than 5k
2. Never weigh more than 25kg @a time.
3. Do they weighing by yourself for yourself, if you have spent a lot of money and energy feeding your fish 4 5months then I don't see a reason y you shldnt finish up the Good work.

Etranshub:
1mm 48% cp, 2mm 45%, 3mm 42%, 4mm 6mm and 8mm 40% prices defer with sizes

robonski15:
interesting. .. Is delivery based on quantity purchased?

robonski15:
interesting. .. Is delivery based on quantity purchased?

robonski15:
interesting. .. Is delivery based on quantity purchased?

robonski15:
MELANGE FISH FARMING

Melange fish farming is one of the most profitable business in catfish farming.. I will be writing in clear and simple english for all to understand..

Melange farming takes 2 and half or 3 months from fingerlings stage to harvest.. Unlike table size fish that last 5months with heavy feeding..

The actuall weight of melange for harvest should be from 300 gramms to 500 gramms... So in a pond that can accomodate a thousand table size of 1kg it will accomodate a thousand five hundred melange or a bit higher... One interesting thing about melange is that you spend less and harvest at three month unlike table size that start eating heavily at the 3rd month till harvest.. To be continued..

robonski15:
The least you should is three making 1kg your aim should be getting 0.5grms i.e two making 1kg.

hisableplc:
on point bro i started dis biz majorly for melange.. I smoke dem.myself also

mozek24:
The answer is yes.

The guy who introduced me into fish in herited his father's 6 rooms "face me I face you" house. He started by setting tiny ponds around the fence, graduated to creating pond at the only available space at the back yard. In January this year he evicted a tenant and converted the room to a pond (about 10 ft by 10ft). In July he evicted another tenant and constructed another pond in the room space. In September he evicted the 3rd tenant and did broilers. He occupies 2 rooms and have a tenant. Do you the that tenant will survive next year in that house?

His reasons:

His tenants pay N2,000 a month and its not regular
2000 *12 = 24,000.

He stocks 1000 table size and sells at about 2kg within 6 months makes about 150,000
150,000 * 2 cycles =N300,000.

According to him he makes about N300,000 for the same space.

I hope that answers your inquiry.

Warning: this is a live scenerio but I won't encourage you to evict your tenants for fish oo.

Merry Christmas all

jites:
@ Fhemmmy i think the standard is usually 10 by 10 feet which should be able to raise 1000 to table size, however, i am not too stuck up on calculation and sizes, but by now every serious non greedy farmer should have the awareness of the fact that overstocking is not ideal, i for one i just make sure a pond is not over stock as this can inhibit their growth and freedom.

As you can see from mine its not the usual 10 by 10 but i am aware of what the standard is and able to use that as a yardstick to make sure the fishes have got enough room to swim around, play and grow.
I think it is also worth noting that although we say 10 by 10 should be stock with at least 1000 but by the time you start sorting them into sizes you may end up with less than the 1000 in a pond due to moving some into a separate pond as a result of their new sizes, that's why it is advisable to have spare capacity to cater for things like
sorting
pond leakages and repairs
disease outbreak and quarantine etc
By the grace of God i have capacity for more ponds to be constructed but i need to test the market and make sure expansion is being driven by demand.

jites:
Thanks Robonski, i discovered that procrastination can be a dream killer sometimes so decided to take the bull by the horn and start with the little we had. There is no better time to start than now.
I want to state here and now so as not to give people some kind of false representation when i said its better to start now.

Firstly, i have been gathering information about fish farming for a while now to the extent Oga Robonski tire for me and kept asking me " when are you starting when are you starting? lol you can ask him so please dont just jump into fish farming without getting the necessary training- both theory and practical.
Following on from the training stuff, my business partner before we started attended a catfish training organised by Oga Robonski in Lagos, Mickyfish also visited our land to give us some advice on how to proceed and also my business partner also went to Songhai in Benin republic to see and learn a few things also.
I have said all these because someone stated and quite rightly that some farmer dont tell the truth and if i am asked any question i will provide truthful answers
Okay back to the original question i was asked by Oga Robonski and Fhemmy the Novice with regards to the dimension and cost, the best thing is to post the cost estimate i was given by the builders exactly but take note of the cememt price cost at the time was 1700 but they used 1800 for the estimate just incase it went up a little during construction so please factor that in.
Also we did german floor and concrete pillars as Robonski had already pointed out.


Estimated size
34 feet by 20 feet (four ponds in one). Each pond is 20feet by 8. 5 feet.
Blocks (6 inches)
Four coaches to make each pond. Total number of blocks will be 396.
Estimated materials
 13 bags of cement for one tipper of sharp sand. 13bags x N1,800(plus transport)=N23,000. 30 blocks from one bag of cement.
 Two tippers of sand N17,000 x 2=N34,000
 Workmanship for molding of 390 blocks x N30 = N11,700
 Rod 10 x N1,100=N11,000
 Rod workmanship N5,000
 Granite (one pick up) N17,000 plus 4 bags of cement for casting of pillars
 8 bags of cement for plaster N14,400 plus 16 water seal N500 x 16 = N8,000
 396 x N10 for blocks setting N3,960 plus helper N2,000
 9 bags of cement for setting of blocks (This could be less than)
 4 board of wood @ N1,200x4=N4,800
 Nails (4 inches and 3 inches) = N400
 Wood union=N500
 Carrying of wood=N500
 Carpenter workmanship=N3,000
 Pouring of German floor, 2 work men @N6,000 plus helper @ N2,000=N8,000
 10 bags of cement for German floor x N1,800=N18,000
 Plumbing estimate N20,000
Total estimate=N198,000

Note: The price of bag of cement is currently N1,700 at the time of this estimate but I just estimated N1,800.

jites:
Thanks Oh Fhemmmy someone has to try and put all this theory into practice.. special thanks to Robinski..I dey trouble the man on whatsapp whenever I notice any casala o. I started with just 30 then decided that I will just keep growing the 30 into broodstock for future hatching exercise.. so Mickfish be on standby o cos I like one hatchery photo you put up one time but I cannot locate it again so i will need your assistance with the construction of a little compact hatchery next year. Presently I stocked 1200 for trial and so far God has been faithful and everything is going according to plan. A little challenge is the 3 days changing of water.. I think it's a kind of waste with no proper drainage system. So I decided to plant some plantains as they use water a lot and then planted some other crops. Next year I intend to by God's grace construct a little earthen pond close by which will mainly be for broodstock growing and some of the water from the concrete pond will be going there.
We have formed a cooperative in our location as there was none and registered it.. more than 20 members now of different aspects from hatchery specialist to grow out guys.
We would endeavour to regulate the price by kilo and take the mono poly from the market women.. We will try a d work with them so everyone is a winner
Members are shareholders buying shares and in turn the pool of fund will be available as credit facility for members and later none members with collateral. Profit distributed by ratio of shares owned
Make the cooperative a platform to get government agricultural grants and assistance.
In the long run hatching, drying and packaging is on the agenda cos one has to try and maximise return with less effort by his Grace. Shalom all

excelsiorfarm:
remedy?? It is good to always understudy your fishes, their needs i.e. Feeding regime, quantity, do slot of your fishes to have uniform/almost uniform sizes, u should cover your ponds too(keep them in d dark)

retin01:
l stocks 500 for four months

retin01:
I just sold some of my fishes last week sept 22 make it four months and d big one were about 1.7kg I don't kw what happen but they are big and I use concrete pond. I intend 2 keep some as brookstock and also dry some

retin01:
I bought post fingerling and 1.8 mm durante it lasted for about 2weeks , 2mm durante 2bags it lasted for about a month, 3mm durante 2bags and I now switch to motifeed 4mm 3bags, motifeed 6mm 12bags, motifeed 9mm about 14bags. but all d bags is about 33bags which is about 500kg feeds. and I just finish drying some of d fish, am a novice like u oooh

Tbagwell1:
That is d more reason y I prefer using fish weighing less dan 2kg for male is b'cos most of them usually have ds very tinny milt nd dark nd watery. As for stripping of d 5kg fish na 3 of us dey handle am.

robonski15:

chairman the green eggs are good but the golden/light brown are better to me i prefer using them.. If u notice that there are some light brown catfish in colour not pure black, they tend to grow faster. Boss you spawn with females weighing 5kg? How do u manage to handle such broodstock for stripping considering the size.. I will prefer the male for that size because of the milt, but later changed my mind when i saw the tiniest milt twice in males above 4kg, i later realized its not by size.

www.agricnetwork.com

TOKUGAWA:
Thanks bro.I mentioned it earlier,its 40/30ft with a dept of 3ft.It can conveniently contain 3k plus fishes to maturity. But I will be starting with 2k due to available funds.