A Community and Forum For Aquaponic Gardeners

Prawns

I have been on the search for fresh water prawns to stock my aquaponics troughs for a year now. During the cource of my search I have learned a lot about them. There is a certain type of prawn that works best in aquaponic troughs called Macrobrachium rosenbergii or giant river prawn. This variety grows very large and has a relatively easy larval stage when compaired to other species. Macrobrachium rosenbergii has a 30 day larval cycle to get to the post larval (PL) stage. During this larval stage salt water is required for the entire stage. There is special food that has to be prepared and feed at short intervals. It is very labor intensive to get them to the PL stage. Once they are able to be weened to fresh water they can be introduced into the troughs with little or no other work involved, other than harvesting. Macrobrachium rosenbergii are farmed commercially world wide.

The prawns that are in our rivers, here in Hawaii, are Macrobrachium lar or Tahitian river prawn. I once introduced prawns, that I caught in Waipio Valley, into my systems and they turned out to be Macrobrachium lar. They did fine for a week but then they began to wonder out of the troughs and died all over the yard. After some research I discovered that they have a several month salt water larval cycle. I found a publication by UH that stated they were finally "successful" at getting a couple of PL's out of hundreds and after several months of raising them. Macrobrachium lar has never been successfuly used in commercial production.

I am working on building my own hatchery so that when I get hold of some Macrobrachium rosenbergii I can raise my own PL's. There are not many people in the state raising PL's for sale and nobody on the Big Island. With how many aquaponic farms we have on the Big Island alone there is a good demand for PL's and that demand is growing state wide.

Prawn production is huge in Thailand and throughout eastern Asia. Hatchery design has been simplified in locations of limited resources, with good hatch rates. They are successful at hatching PL's in third world countries, so we should be able to do it here!

This pic is Macrobrachium lar from Waipio Valley.

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Larry Yonashiro on February 21, 2011 at 9:10am

Thanks for sharing your findings, Chris. Will be following your work with great interest.

You're doing some really important work for the future of this planet...

"...The United Nations has predicted the global population will reach seven billion this year, and climb to nine billion by 2050, "with almost all of the growth occurring in poor countries, particularly Africa and South Asia," said John Bongaarts of the non-profit Population Council.

To feed all those mouths, "we will need to produce as much food in the next 40 years as we have in the last 8,000," said Jason Clay of the World Wildlife Fund at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)... " http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110220/ts_alt_afp/scienceuspopulation...

Permalink Reply by Chi Ma on February 21, 2011 at 9:17am

If you need a Prawn Supplier Aquaculture of Texas seems to be the place to go.

Permalink Reply by Chris Smith on February 21, 2011 at 11:06am

Chi, other than being every expensive, it is not very easy to ship live animals into the State of Hawaii due to rules and regulations. I am also trying to keep the inputs into my systems local so I don't really want to import them form Texas. I have known about the hatchery for some time now and it is a great option for those of you on the mainland.

Chi Ma said:

If you need a Prawn Supplier Aquaculture of Texas seems to be the place to go.

Permalink Reply by AlbertF on February 23, 2011 at 11:45am

"Freshwater prawn (Macrobrachium rosenbergii) post larvae now available. Fifty cents each. Also, limited number of juveniles available, $1.00 each. Minimum order on Oahu is $50 for farm pickup. Call 382-8674 or email LSGusman@yahoo.com."

Linda Gusman, copied from aquaculturehub.com

I havent contacted her, but so far its the only lead for malaysian prawns in Hawaii. Also, this back in September... Let me know how it all goes

Permalink Reply by AlbertF on February 23, 2011 at 11:49am

From what i've read, if you purchase 500 PL, only 250 will survive to market because of territorial fighting. From the 8 larger ones i've had, only 2 survive.

Permalink Reply by Larry Yonashiro on February 23, 2011 at 2:16pm

Thanks for the contact, Albert. I called Linda Gusman, and she does not have any for sale at this time, but will in a couple of months. Will check back then.