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Bluegill for Aquaponics

I've discovered that instead of the 300 gallon fish tank I was planning for my aquaponics system (stocked with catfish), my wife is more comfortable with a 150-170 gallon tank due to the large footprint required for the larger tank. So I've been researching fish for my smaller tank. I want to maximize fish for the space. I've received many suggestions for bluegill, so I did a little research via Google. Surprise, surprise....bluegill are being researched as a lower cost alternative to tilapia for commercial sales. I would prefer a native fish to tilapia anyway, so besides catfish, blueguill are sounding more and more attractive. They seem to be pretty hardy and tolerant.

Here's an article from my native state that I ran across tonight: http://www.columbiamissourian.com/stories/2010/01/15/bluegill-fish-...

Now if I can just grow them out to 1 lb in my aquaponics system, I'll be a very happy man.

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Comment by Kellen Weissenbach on March 17, 2011 at 2:01am: Many of my friends in the pond and lake management industry have claimed to have serious issues with "Georgia Giants". Essentially, they are just a hybrid bluegill (BG X GSF), which has been around for far longer than Ken's and their "Georgia Giant". I have heard that the GG stock quality has been claimed to be fairly inconsistent and often low quality with lots of deformities and slow growth rates. This comes from some of the leaders in the pond management industry. Ironically, several hatchery owners I know state they have actually sold HBG (hybrid bluegill) to Ken's when they have exhausted their in house stock of GG's and assume they passed them off as GG's. An acquaintance of mine, who lives in Nebraska, is probably the world's leader in Northern Strain Bluegill improvement. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if his strain is being used for the study mentioned above, particularly considering his ties to NU. Anyway, he purchased some Georgia Giants to trial for himself, and was extremely disappointed. Pictures of many of the fish he received are available on a couple of websites. I've seen them. Not good.

Now, pure strain bluegill will reproduce just fine in fairly small systems. I've gotten them to spawn numerous times in tanks as small as 55 gallon aquariums. I would definitely say they are less predictable than tilapia in this regard, but still quite doable. In my 14 acre pond/mini lake, the males will begin "nesting" pretty soon, and they'll spawn multiple times throughout the summer and early fall. The shallows in certain parts of my pond will look like the surface of a golf ball, from all the BG nests. In each "dimple" you'll see a male BG guarding his nest and attacking any fish that comes too close, including largemouth bass, catfish, shiners, crappie, white bass, hybrid striped bass and even other bluegill. Bluegill are extremely aggressive during spawning season.

With regard to food... BG will readily accept the same types of commercially available food as tilapia, but I would try to keep them on a higher protein diet at the adult growout stage than we often keep adult tilapia on. They do not offer as good of a conversion rate as tilapia, but it is more like about 2:1 in practice, and they do grow slower, but at a reasonable rate none the less. Like tilapia, bluegill are omnivores. However, while tilapia naturally prefer a diet consisting more of plant life and detritus, bluegill prefer a diet consisting more of invertebrates (scuds, crustaceans, freshwater shrimp, larvae, etc.) as well as small fish. As a result, foods higher in easily digested proteins, particularly fishmeal are essential to fast growth.

Comment by David Waite on March 13, 2011 at 9:46pm: Pearcy great arcticle on Blue gill hybrids. I hope you go for it and keep us posted. I would take a blue over cat or tilapia any day. I went for cats due to the great conversion ratio. Hope the hybrids are comparable.

Comment by B. Pearcy on March 13, 2011 at 3:03pm: Well, according to www.floridafishfarms.com Georgia Giants aka Bluegill X green sunfish hybrids are illegal to possess in Florida.

Comment by TCLynx on March 13, 2011 at 2:39pm: well the average blue gill grown in a tank fed just fish food is probably not a star. But... Bluegill are pretty hardy and as you say, some of the hybreds have really amazing growth rates.

People manage to grow lots of tilapia in farm ponds with little to no money spent on fish feed if the pond is relatively fertile. Bluegill might be a good choice of fish where one wants to experiment with alternative home grown feeds.

I've known people who set up swimming pool aquaponics and blue gill bred in there so I expect it would be possible for large system owners to breed their own stock.

Blue gill may tend to be small but they are good eating.

Comment by Scott lemonds on March 13, 2011 at 12:52pm: The problem with this story is ,bluegill do not have a good fishmeal conversion rate.

I think its something like a four to one .The other is ,these guys are about 10 years behind the georgia giant bluegill.These guys are not innovators they are duplicators.There is absolutely nothing wrong with that,Im a big fan of duplication.Around here its known as the get her done philosophy.Kens fish hatchery is the place to get georgia giants.They are almost as fast as tilapia ,and they too have net cages.