Oh yes, I do understand what you mean. I had this experience, and am force to learn from ground zero. On the bright side, am now progressing to learn propagation.
I believe we shall all be able to make it. Just put in more effort, keep learning and don't give up. 

Year 2012 coming to an end. Need to take stock on what had been done during the this year and plan my strategy for 2013.

Hi Agri venturers,

Good day to you. I'm an IT personnel now into tilapia farming in Kuala Selangor for about 4 months. My partner actually has been running the farm for the past 3 years, and i have jumped in the wagon to assist him. We currently growing in semen ponds.

We are revamping filter system and increasing ponds, hopefully to start with new fries by February latest.

I have most of the part covered, except a good source to buy tilapia fry / brood-stocks. I have been following the agri thread , and i believe there is a new hybrid variety is available , and able to reach maturity size in less than 4 months.

Our current batch has been growing slowly, apart from many other issues i believe in-breeding is one them. It will be a great assistance if anyone could provide
contact, whom dealing with hybrid variety / mono sex tilapia fry or brood stocks.

Dear M Century,

I think we have been in touch before regards your fish feed. I'm waiting for my partner to be back fr travelling, then should arrange an appointment with you.Thanks for the heads up on hybrid marketing issue. Guess i have to try in small batch and try to sell it with my current buyers.

The problem with the common fries, i believe there is no proper control over in-breeding. Unless you know the breeder well, and tested their fries before.
The last batch my partner  bought, (somewhere in rawang) exceeded 8 months. Hope  you can give me the contact of current breeder your taking from.
And as for the 30cent hybrid, do you any idea whom is dealing it? I wanna check possibility of getting brood stock.

Going on about the Clarias catfish aquaculture...

I did a bit of research on supply-demand, and I'm quite surprised by the absolute demand for the fish, and the low supply occuring.

Just a few examples of the kind of demand I've found:
> 1 wholesaler in KL is looking for a supplier that is able to produce 2mt of catfish a day; price offered is RM3/kg. Date of tender is 8 March 2013.

> 1 wholesaler in Sungai Buloh, looking for supplier of catfish, 50kg/day or 300kg a week. Offer price is RM3/kg, size requirement is ~200g per fish. Date of tender is 21 Feb 2013. Guy cites that he himself is a catfish producer, but is unable to fulfill the overwhelming demand.

And these are just a few to name. There are many more wholesalers looking for this fish.

But the main issue, I've found, is that those who culture the catfish using pellets are complaining that costs are too high to support the tender prices of RM3/kg. Those that have been successful in cost control seem to be using animal proteins such as chicken guts, fish heads etc. as feed. However, consumers are complaining that such fish have high fat content, and don't taste as good.

There's also this group that's producing "organic" catfish. How it figures as "organic" is beyond me, but they are able to market the fish wholesale at about RM5/kg, while retail prices are around RM7/kg.

A general cost breakdown of a "hobby" catfish aquaculture set:
> N150 polytank x 3 (i.e. 200 gallon x 3)= RM615
> Water treatment chemicals = RM30
> Fish feed = RM50 a barrel
> Fish fry = RM0.15 x 2000 = RM300
> Net = RM10
> PVC Pipes = RM 1 x 20m = RM20
> Aquarium pump = RM27
> Utility supply = RM60 (for 3 months)
TOTAL COSTS: RM1,112


Assuming 10% death rate of stocked fish, and 6 fish to a kilo, the setup above gives 1,800 fish or 300kg total weight in 3 months @ RM3/kg. This equates to RM900. Less fixed costs of RM400 (for fries, feed, and utility supply), the nett returns is RM500 every cycle.

Now a N150 tank has an area of about 2.2 square meters, so 3 tanks will take up about 7 square meters (roughly 24 square feet). So an average sized backyard of about 300 square feet would hold about 12 sets (36 tanks). If assuming one does all sets in 3-month cycles, that's on average RM6,000 nett a cycle, or about RM2,000 a month. Not too bad for 300 square feet.

And in terms of production, 12 sets will produce about 3.6mt a cycle (1.2mt/month, or 300kg/week, or about 50kg/day). Not a figure which could become a hard-sell, especially if you find wholesalers like I've noted above. Of if you aren't too fussy about selling it yourself, you could market it to groups of vendors at wetmarkets. Might get better prices too.

ParaOp

Thanks for replying.

We were thinking of using the cage system as we have the water body size.
We are also thinking of the vertically integrated system from cultivation/production to filleting/freezing/packing.

As far as Capex is concerned, we have no limits. We have access to funding.
What would be a the ball park investment per acre?

In your opinion, how much would be the average operating costs in RM per ton of fish?

Thanks for sharing! 

Hi M

Thanks very much for your input.

I know the lake very well.
We are indeed thinking of employing some experts.
I understand there is a large tilapia setup in Perak. That's what we are thinking of.

Our market would be predominantly overseas where we probably fetch better prices.

Whats your yield from your two ponds?

Yes. Feed costs is the highest portion of operating costs.
Therefore we are thinking of the holistic approach from fries, cultivation to packaging, feedmeal manufacturing, etc.
Thinking of using the cage systems.

are the operating risks associated with such venture?
One of concern is the waste as in the fish poo. Is the contamination by such waste a big concern for a large
lake with continuous inflow of water from streams?What

Hi M-Century, any chances of you going to your pond on 26 ~ 29th April, would lie to follow & look see, if it's permitted    I still harbor an interest of aquaculture
(very small scale, integrated farming ) just that I'm still working on my phase 1, agriculture.

hi Mcentury,
wanna ask i've been told there is difference on the tilapia grade, some fish will not grow after it reached palm size. is that true? Any place to get good quality fish fry?

Hello Sir(s),

This is my first post to the thread. I started an aquaculture venture with a few partners a year ago. We did try on poly tanks for red tilapia but didnt work out as the tanks we found were not that feasible as we could only healthily stock 300+- adult tilapia in one tank. The tanks were 3000 liter(600 gallon) circular poly tanks from BNC n measured 2mx2m. Now we've switched to concrete tanks that were used for paper factory 20 yrs ago and re-do a system and piping for aquaculture. I've been following this thread since half a year ago and find it very informative and a very positive sharing attitude among most members in all areas of agriculture and aquaculture. I truly appreciate the generosity all the masters and sifus and pros and other people have given and now I also want to participate in this thread, to learn as well as to share on whatever knowledge I have learned.

Regarding fish fries, do you know of any good suppliers in Perak, as I am based here. I have been getting from Kam Sing(kampar) and Wong(gopeng) and have had bad results - up to 70%-90% mortality rate. Only the fries i get from kk road(Ng) is good, only 15-30% mortality rate. I'm not sure what the problem is, is it the groundwater im using not enough oxygen cause not enough sunlight in storage tank? or not enough days under the sun? is there a way to check or to tell if the water is good enough? or is it calcium or malnutrition from the water source? any suggestions?

cause in the storage tank we also have like 1000-2000 fish, and they grow till grade A fish in 7-8 months with minimal feed, and those were leftover fry from the last harvest from that tank. So im guessing the water quality shouldnt be too bad if the fish there can grow and breed as well. does rust also play a big part with fish health? as our concrete tanks are old n reused and some have metal bits with rust.

or was it because of the rainy season and the water was too cold? The earlier batch was a bit bigger and wasnt affected much and they were in the same system, but the new batch died during the rainy season during 9 wong yeh. We were saying that the 9 wong yeh came and took some fishes back. haha.

I am currently looking for new red tilapia suppliers for the next batch. Planning to get from a few sources and grow them side by side to see the differences in quality and growth rates. Been getting them at 6cents-9cents depending on size. I grow the fry in 20x10 ft tanks in 3-4 ft of water and stock 2000-2500 per tank till 6-8 inches. Then transfer them to growout tanks which are 30x30ft and 10ft in depth and stock 6000-10000 per tank. I know the depth is not ideal as oxygen goes lower in deeper water n less surface area. but we have one 3hp swirling paddlewheel in each tank which I think is good enough. Fish have been growing to 500gms in 5 months, so we still need to improve. I dont think there's a problem with the growout tanks. Just the fry tanks aren't good enough. Maybe not enough aeration as their appetite is pretty low - 2-5% of bodyweight in average. Hard to get them to consume more. When in the growout tanks, their appetite is like monsters. Throw two bags finish in 5mins. Feed until scared.

I'm just a noob with a lot of interest in fish, been fishing for over 20 yrs and been gutting fish since then haha. Stumbled into aquaculture/aquaponics 8 years ago, got interested and started doing research. Then came back to malaysia and then my partners asked me to join them, what a dream come true.

Joined this thread in hopes of getting help solving problems i face at work and also to help out if someone has a similar problem and also to b**** about work, haha. What a long-winded first post. Lol. Thanks all for your time to read/reply to my post. Cheers!!  

Hi Mr farmer. Not a good idea for a visit. We are still building and renovating a lot and the place is in a mess. Maybe in a few months should be alright. Our place is such a mess now, not worth a visit yet.

Can i ask? What type of farm is ur fren intending to do? Concrete, poly tanks or earthen ponds?
If ur fren really wants a visit to a farm, i know of a farm in rawang doing tilapia which is one of the biggest players, i think. And they are also distributors for CP(starfeed). I think that is a better choice for a visit for ur fren. Our system also isnt that good yet and needs a lot of improvement. Maybe i can post up some pictures later so your fren can have an idea of how it looks like?

Any farms that you know that allows visiting? Was thinking of taking my friend there to look see, before he does more decision. Thanks.

My fry mortality is quite high, between 30-50%. The last batch we just graded was 50%. But recorded mortality was about 20-30%. Really headache to answer to my partners about this rate of mortality. Have to rethink my fry tanks, should be DO too low, as appetite is low and also water quality. Need to condition the water longer as its underground water.

When adding the fry i do the condition them before adding to the tank. 10 mins for the temp to level out and add water slowly to the bags before releasing.

1. Not too sure how to tell if the fish is exercising too much. How to tell? Will having too much exercise,reduce their weight as well? Like humans doing cardio and dropping weight. Same principle??

2. Profit margin is low, so must use economies of scale to counter. After all the variable costs are feed, electricity and water. Only thing can reduce is feed, so the lower FCR, the more profits. Thats my thought process la. So have to find 'free' supplement feed to reduce pellet cost. Duckweed, veggie waste, expired bread etcetc.

3. Not too clean, just not enough conditioning.

FCR is between 0.7-1.3. The lower it is, the more $$$ u make..

Planning to do catfish now. Need to do proposal plan for my partners.. Anyone can help with the costing?

Sir,
You do sound like you know your stuff really well. Much thanks for your advice and views.

I heard of the rawang farm not long ago from a distributor, and was looking for ways to visit myself. I guess its only normal for them to keep their secret though.

When you speak about whats at the bottom of the pond, does this relate to concrete tanks too? Or did you mean for earthen ponds?

9.5/10??? Wow, thats really upsetting to hear. For me, i really think if given the right system, management and sufficient funds, there are profits to be made. But then that is only theoretical, because in reality there are so much more problems than rearing the fish itself - economy, marketing, sales, pricing, management, weather etcetc all makes a difference to your total yield. My biggest problem so far is the marketing and sales. Would you say that there are too many tilapia suppliers around and too few distributors/buyers? Or is it that i have not dug deep enough to find buyers? I have went online, wholesale markets, normal markets and etcetc, but i still have only around 5 distributors who provides transport but also arent that reliable. Promise to collect fish next week, but no show/give excuse cannot take the fish. Thinking of transporting fish myself now, so im not at their mercy.

Yes i am fully hands on, as we started without foreign workers. So we did everything ourselves, until the last 3 months where we finally got foreign workers to come in. However, i still have to lead the boys by example and also to show them the working pace that is accepted. So i still am hands on even with foreign workers in. Only by being hands on, i can understand more and get more ideas to improve. Ive gotten so dark nowadays, my indian friends are laughing at me. Lol! They be like "bro why u so black?". Haha

And i totally agree with you on your statement - succeeding whr most fail will definitely make big money!