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Raising Bluegill for Food #7311070 03/20/12 05:03 PM
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cypher_orange Offline OP
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Hey everyone.
I think I am going to try my hand at raising some bluegill and other sunnies for a food source. I plan to raise them in big galvanized stock water tanks (720 gallon and greater). Nothing fancy. Just something that will allow me to run out in the yard and grab a few fish now and then. Anyone have any experience with this. I plan to feed pellet food and supplement with some worms from the compost bin. Here are a few stipulations:
Startup has to be fairly inexpensive
The setup has to be aesthetically pleasing. Nothing that sticks out and looks ugly.
I don't have much spare time so a setup with minimal time investment.
And I want it to be fun and enjoyable. Not a chore.
Hopefully with my existing garden, solar power, water collection etc this will help offset costs even more. And no...I'm not some crazy doomsday prepper or hippy. I just enjoy raising my own food and see a lot of benefits doing so. Thanks.


Re: Raising Bluegill for Food [Re: cypher_orange] #7311192 03/20/12 05:25 PM
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Cloud Dancer Offline
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I hope you have better luck than Canyon Lake.... grin

Are 'gills considered that much of a delicacy? Seems like a lot of trouble to raise them. Plus, you miss out on the fun of fishing for them.

Sorry, can't help you.



Need to improve my LMB fishing, running out of time.
Re: Raising Bluegill for Food [Re: cypher_orange] #7312907 03/20/12 11:18 PM
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Meadowlark Offline
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If it was easy, lots of people would be doing this. The truth is it's not. In small tanks as described, you will have constant water quality concerns and issues to deal with. It isn't just a matter of running out in the yard and grabbing some fish to eat.

You need water change, circulation, aeration, and filtering as well as feeding system. Bluegills do well on artificial feeds, but benefit most from multiple small feedings per day rather than one or two big feedings. All that food is digested and the wastes are dumped in the water...these must be removed in small systems as you described.

If you can overcome the water quality issues and resulting material expenses and labor costs, then you need to be prepared to feed and manage for a couple of years to get decent sized fish produced.

Do your homework... a good source for reading are the articles published by the SRAC at this link

https://srac.tamu.edu/index.cfm/event/home/

Please don't misunderstand....not trying to discourage you, but if you understand the amount of time and money required to do this on a small scale...and you still want to do it, you will be better prepared. Good luck.


Re: Raising Bluegill for Food [Re: Meadowlark] #7313032 03/20/12 11:50 PM
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Originally Posted By: Meadowlark
If it was easy, lots of people would be doing this. The truth is it's not. In small tanks as described, you will have constant water quality concerns and issu.......................................................................

Please don't misunderstand....not trying to discourage you, but if you understand the amount of time and money required to do this on a small scale...and you still want to do it, you will be better prepared. Good luck.



What Meadowlark said. I have a 1900 gallon ( formerly koi ) pond with 'gills , red-bellies and bream. One 'gill and one red-belly have been in there for about 2 years and they're monsters ( close to 12" ) but the pond is heavily planted / stocked with gambusia and has a 200 gallon bio-filter.
I feed pellet food as well as shiners and worms .
Growing them out isn't a big problem as long as the filtration is taken care of but your biggest problem (IMO) will come during breeding season. They get pretty territorial during this time and you're probably going to have a lot of the smaller ones killed.
If you have a good source of fry and don't want them to grow too big , a stock tank just might make a good grow-out tank. thumb



Re: Raising Bluegill for Food [Re: cypher_orange] #7313133 03/21/12 12:21 AM
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cypher_orange Offline OP
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I definitely appreciate the input. I'm sure that there are aspects I'm over looking. I'm getting comments from all over the spectrum. From..."Just slap 'em in a 55 gallon drum and clean one up every few days...that's what I do"...to some making it sound like its nearly impossible and 10's of thousands of dollars. Like most things I'm sure the truth is somewhere in the middle.

I'm not looking for trophy fish. I think gills taste best around 6 inches or so and this is probably when I would harvest. I have solar electric panels (came with the house) so that takes care of one expense.

Still just toying with the idea and I appreciate the feed back.


Re: Raising Bluegill for Food [Re: cypher_orange] #7313511 03/21/12 01:29 AM
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Don Morey Offline
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For growth rate you may be better of raising carp.


Re: Raising Bluegill for Food [Re: cypher_orange] #7314336 03/21/12 03:47 AM
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I don't think raising fish to eat in an enclosed environment and/or trough is worth it. Too much money/work/time to see benefits, and waaaaaay too many quality control issues.

Plus they are easy to catch most times of year.

Now if just to keep and watch, that's a different story.

If you end up doing it, I hope it works out well, and you share some tips.

Those were just the thoughts that went thru my head.



Don't worry about the mule, just load the cart
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