A Community and Forum For Aquaponic Gardeners

Pacu fish, anyone?

http://www.pacufish.org/

Tilapia are bulletproof and all, but wouldn't it be great to grow a good tasting aquaponic fish? Hell yeah!

My business partner is very interested in growing the pacu fish, a kind of vegetarian piranha. They grow fast, are omnivorous, and supposedly very tasty.

Any experience on this?

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Permalink Reply by TCLynx on March 6, 2011 at 5:56pm

Sylvia wrote a blog about Pacu at one point.

http://www.aquaponicgardeningblog.com/?s=pacu

They require even warmer water than tialpia do or perhaps I should say then can't survive as much cool water as tilapia can.

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Permalink Reply by Sylvia Bernstein on March 6, 2011 at 6:56pm

Thanks for remembering that, TC. I love pacus...but more as a pet than as an edible. They are just cool swimming amongst my tilapia. Not that I'm against eating them... sometimes you just have to chose sides...to eat, or not to eat? Is it a pet or dinner? I find that distinction really interesting, especially if you leave moral judgement out and try to come up with some sort of unemotional criteria. What is it that makes something ok to eat? It's not cute? Lambs and baby calves are pretty cute. Not intelligent? Pigs are supposed to be very intelligent. Just tastey? How about dogs, cats and horses. Could be a fascinating discussion topic ...what about koi and goldfish? Too expensive? Hmmm...

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Permalink Reply by TCLynx on March 6, 2011 at 7:07pm

almost everything is eaten in some part of the world or another. It is interesting to figure out. See the ducklings are terribly cute when they are young but if we didn't rank them as food pretty quickly we would be over run with hungry ducks here.

I suppose a major side of it, you really can only keep as many pets as you can really afford. How many tilapia are you going to keep feeding when they breed and become stunted in a small tank? Or do you expand the system to support more and more fish since you are not eating them? If you are raising fancy koi you probably don't eat the good ones because they will bring more cash if you grow them bigger and sell them but I know of people who will eat the culls.

Us, we farm for food.

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Permalink Reply by David Waite on March 6, 2011 at 10:39pm

Sylvia had one in her tank and it was a fantastic fish. Might give her a jingle on it. Good luck and keep us posted.

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Permalink Reply by Marina Galvan on March 9, 2011 at 12:21am

TC, i didn't quite understand what you said-- we farm for food too. And we eat our tilapia. however I would prefer something yummier. are your channel catfish more edible than the blue tilapia? I'm interested in giving catfish a try. Our 80sqft friendly style raft system is the guinea pig for the 2600sqft commercial system in construction. if we can find a more suitable fish (read: tastier) i would be thrilled. and hopefully some restaurants and farmer's markets would be thrilled too.

TCLynx said:

almost everything is eaten in some part of the world or another. It is interesting to figure out. See the ducklings are terribly cute when they are young but if we didn't rank them as food pretty quickly we would be over run with hungry ducks here.

I suppose a major side of it, you really can only keep as many pets as you can really afford. How many tilapia are you going to keep feeding when they breed and become stunted in a small tank? Or do you expand the system to support more and more fish since you are not eating them? If you are raising fancy koi you probably don't eat the good ones because they will bring more cash if you grow them bigger and sell them but I know of people who will eat the culls.

Us, we farm for food.

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Permalink Reply by Marina Galvan on March 9, 2011 at 12:25am

bummer! I clicked on this link http://www.aquaponicgardeningblog.com/?s=pacu and got this message saying the website was suspended due to server overload. hopefully this was an isolated incident. I would love to read about sylvia's experience with the pacu.

Your website has been suspended!

The web hosting account that hosts this website has been blocked due to server overload!

If you are the owner of this website, please contact the support team to resolve this issue.

If you are a visitor to this website, please access this page later.

This website is hosted by duoservers.com/?s=mindscapehosting.

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Permalink Reply by Ryan Chatterson on March 9, 2011 at 4:29am

Never tried Pacu, any idea what other fish it's similar to in taste?

You guys could probably grow some Striped bass...might be recieved a bit better over there than Tilapia. Mmmmmmm.....striped baaaaaass.

Marina Galvan said:

bummer! I clicked on this link http://www.aquaponicgardeningblog.com/?s=pacu and got this message saying the website was suspended due to server overload. hopefully this was an isolated incident. I would love to read about sylvia's experience with the pacu.

Your website has been suspended!

The web hosting account that hosts this website has been blocked due to server overload!

If you are the owner of this website, please contact the support team to resolve this issue.

If you are a visitor to this website, please access this page later.

This website is hosted by duoservers.com/?s=mindscapehosting.

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Permalink Reply by TCLynx on March 9, 2011 at 7:52am

I was responding to Sylvia's tendency to turn fish into pets when I said we farm for food.

All sorts of fish are good and please let us know what you find out as you try new things.

With the Pacu they really do need warm water. I believe they are truly a tropical fish while the tilapia are a sub-tropical fish.

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Permalink Reply by Chi Ma on March 9, 2011 at 8:07am

I hate fish. Eating them anyways.

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Permalink Reply by Myles Harston on March 9, 2011 at 10:28am

I have grown hundreds of Pacu. They grew almost twice as fast as tilapia, They ate a wide range of things from grapes, diced zucchini, shelled corn to name a few (they only ate the heart of the seed and left the rest). They were difficult to process because they have a very tough hide. the hide is used in Brazil for high quality purses and gloves. You should check with your state's DNR to make sure they are legal in an aquaculture setting.. I did not care for the taste. I thought our tilapia was better tasting. Pacu also have very fine 'Y' bones in part of the fillet much like a Northern Pike. The Brazilians grind that part of the filet for fish patties but I found it to be a pain to deal with.

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Permalink Reply by Sylvia Bernstein on March 10, 2011 at 5:34am

Yeah, been having some hosting problems. It was back up shortly after you looked for it, Marina.

I'll get around to eating my tilapia someday...maybe. You'll be the first to know, TC. Had lots of folks tour the greenhouse volunteer to do the deed. I'm just fascinated with the notion of when do you keep something as a pet, vs when do you raise it as food? No one (expect for maybe me ) thinks of tilapia as pets, but Pacu are sold in the aquarium section of Petsmart here. As Myles pointed out, however, they are very often raised as food in S. America. I think they are beautiful, sweet fish...but I respect that they are also thought of as decent food (at least before I read Myle's post!). The blog post you are linking to above is kind of a philosophical exploration of this line of thought.