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Tips For Growing Tilapia

Posted on by Posted in Aquaponics, Help Leave a comment

Tilapia is a fresh water fish. They grow very fast and they are often used in aquaponics systems.
Tilapia is pretty easy to grow. This post will teach you how to grow them.

Species
Start by deciding what species you want to grow. The most common are Blue tilapia and Nile tilapia.
The Blue tilapia grows pretty slow but it is the most cold tolerant species of tilapia.
The Nile tilapia grows much faster but only in tropical conditions.

Stock
Then decide how many tilapias you want to grow. You should put 5 to 6 fingerlings per square meter of water surface area.
If you already have adult tilapia and want to breed them, then you should put 1 male for every 3 females.

Temperature
The recommended temperature for tilapia is between 28 and 30 degrees C.
The growth rate will decrease if the water temperature is below 20 degrees C.

Food
Algae is their most common food in the wild. But tilapia also eat pellets and dog food.

Tilapia Mating Process

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I just saw the greatest thing in my life.
About 2 days ago I caught a few tilapias from my pond and put them in an aquarium to see how their mating goes.
The ones I had weren’t really doing something so I went back today to catch other ones. I was seeing a really beautiful one that I wanted to catch. And I did it.
So I caught a few more to replace the ones I already had. And I found the biggest tilapia I had. If I’m correct, it is a female. So she will be able to lay eggs.

I now have about 2 to 3 males and 3 or 4 females in the aquarium. In total I have about 6 tilapias in there.

Since I know for sure that I have 2 males, I put 2 planting pots in the aquarium. Both facing different sides of the aquarium. Each male settled down in one of them.

The great thing that I just saw is that one of the males changed his color. They are normally all grey with black spots. But this time, the male was full black with some white spots. And had red fin. I’ve never seen one like this. It was plain beauty! He came out of his territory and was chasing the females.
So I think he is in the mood for mating. And I hope they will soon make pairs so I can see how that process goes.

I’ve read a lot of articles that say that the tilapias change color when they are in the mood for mating. I never saw it myself. But now I finally did!

Tilapias are breeding

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I’ve been very busy these days without having time to post anything on the blog.
But I’m still here.

It has been more than a month since I’ve had my tilapias. I got them when they were about 5 cm long. I’ve put them in a aquarium for a while. Then I put them in the pond where they are now. They were about 15 cm back then.

Recently I found some baby guppies swimming on the surface of the water. Since they are SO small, I captured them and put them in a “desk aquarium” in my room on my desk so they won’t get eaten.
Then I few days later, I found some baby fish swimming in the pond. They were actually a lot! So I captured them thinking they were guppies. But when I put them in the aquarium with the guppies, I saw that they are totally different.

What I saw different was:

  • The baby guppies were much smaller then the others
  • Guppies have colors. They were all dark grey
  • When trying to catch them I realized that they dive deeper when I come close to them with the net. Guppies don’t do this. They stay at the surface.
  • They eat a lot more than guppies normally do.
  • They grow faster than guppies

    • So I kept looking at these unknown fish to figure out what it was. And I found out that they are Tilapias. They have the same body structure. The adult tilapias also eat a lot and the adult tilapias also grow fast.
    Since that day I kept finding more and more babies in the pond. A few days ago I had found a large amount again. I think those are from another pair. And I think that there are still more in there.

    But I’m taking very good care of them and once they get too big for that aquarium, I’ll put them in a larger aquarium till they are about 10cm long.

    Have any of you guys grown tilapias? What was your experience with them? I’m still new at growing them.

    Update on my garden #7

    Posted on by Posted in Aquaponics, Compost, Help, Hydroponics, Nutrients, Pests, Plants/Garden, Seeds Leave a comment

    There has been a lot going on in my garden these days. And not to spam you guys with too much posts, I decided to put them all in one.

    Worms
    I started growing a few mature worms in a worm factory a few weeks ago.

    I read that it is better to separate the juveniles and cocoons from the mature worms. Because worms reproduce depending on their habitat. The more space they have, the more they will reproduce. I already have 2 worm bins, so I searched for worm cocoons in the worm factory to put them in the other (larger) worm bin. The worms that are in the worm factory are only mature worms.

    After collecting the cocoons, I went to put them in their new home. And I collected the mature worms from that bin to put them in the worm factory. So only the juveniles and cocoons stay in there.

    Now let’s wait for the worms to keep reproduce. Every 3 weeks I’ll check for more worm cocoons.

    Tilapia

    As I already wrote in an earlier article, I started growing some tilapia.

    Those Tilapia eat a lot. Every 3 hours or so, I feed them. And they eat everything. But they don’t eat at night. Only during the day.

    Aquaponics -> Vermiponics

    Yesterday I learned about vermiponics. This is almost the same as aquaponics. But in here you don’t use fish, you use worms to provide nutrients for the plants. The names is a combination of hydroponics and vermicompost.

    Tomorrow I’ll start experimenting with this system. I’ll turn my mini aquaponics system into a vermiponics. It will be an aquaponics and vermiponics. Because right now, the guppies will stay in there.

    Harvesting

    Today I harvested Pak Choi and Lettuce for the first time to taste them.

    They said that the Pak Choi tasted really good (I haven’t tasted it myself). And the lettuce was good too (this one I did taste).

    Before the harvest

     

     

     

    This is the Pak Choi before I harvested them.

     

     

     

     

     

     

     And this is the Pak Choi after harvesting them. 

    Using my own worm tea

    After I’ve harvested my Pak Choi and Lettuce, they haven’t had a lot of leaves. So I’m going to add worm tea to the plants to boost their growth so they can get their leaves back.

     

    A few new plants

    I started growing a few plants in a raised bed and a few in a half drum. Mostly tomatoes.

    Growing Tilapia

    Posted on by Posted in Aquaponics Leave a comment

    Last week I got some baby Tilapia fishes & shrimps and a few days ago, I started making a bin for them.

    Yesterday I transferred the Tilapia fishes from the aquarium where they were in since last week to their new home. But I had some troubles when filling the bin with water. It was leaking.

    So I had to take some of the water out to fix it. I’ve put glue where the water was coming out. I let it dry the whole night.

    And today I went to check it and I decided to test it out. I filled it with more water (the fishes stayed in the bin. The water level before the leakage was just right for them).
    I kept filling it with water till I got to where I want the water to be. And there was no leakage anymore.

    In the bin I’ve put 3 PVC pipes so when they are breeding, they can hide. I’ve also put some gravel in the bottom so they can lay there eggs in it.
    I have 2 airstones in the bin. I didn’t know if 1 was enough. So I decided to add another one.
    I’ve made something to put their food in from a 2 liter soda bottle.

    Now let’s see the Tilapia fishes grow!

     

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