The Aquaculturists: December 2014

Friday, December 19, 2014

Season's Greetings!

Season’s Greetings to our readers from all of us here at Perendale Publishers! A big thank you for following our blog this year, and here’s wishing you a great holiday and a Happy New Year!

The Aquaculturists
This blog is maintained by The Aquaculturists staff and is supported by the
magazine International Aquafeed which is published by Perendale Publishers Ltd

For additional daily news from aquaculture around the world: aquaculture-news

ANDRITZ Feed Technologies company profile

ANDRITZ Feed Technologies is a unique company with the ability to manufacture and supply each and every machine in the feed extrusion line. With an intricate knowledge of each key process, we can supply a compatible and homogeneous solution from raw material intake to finished feed bagging.

Today’s high demands for cost effective, quality and high performance feeds makes it obvious that producing quality feeds requires a high level of specialized processing technology.

Our solutions are simple and effective. We strive to be a “one-stop” all-round supplier for all extrusion needs. Our packages are tailor-made to suit the specific requirements of our customers, whether it is know-how, engineering, individual process machines, complete processing lines or spare parts and service availability.

Easy-to-operate and maintainable plants and systems with short implementation time and excellent performance set us apart from the competition. Competence engineering leadership and worldwide co-operation business units in addition to staff commitment and dynamics distinguish us from other suppliers.

Through outstanding performance, mastery of key-process technologies and engineering capabilities, ANDRITZ Feed Technologies has become a globally leading supplier of extrusion equipment and systems.

Experienced project managers and experts from specialized functions ensure that the expected performance will be achieved.

Being the worldwide largest supplier of equipment to the feed industry with more than century of experience, manufacturing facilities on three different continents, 14 sales and service companies plus a supplementary worldwide distribution network, we are confident to claim that ANDRITZ Feed Technologies is able to supply an optimum technology solution for any possible need for aquatic feed and pet food plants.

Read the article HERE.

19/12/2014: Sea eagles eat more lamb than fish

White-tailed sea eagles eat more lamb than fish, despite their name, according to images captured on the west coast of Scotland, the Telegraph reports.

A camera study set up in the Lorn area of Argyll to determine what the eagles were eating found that the birds brought eight or nine lambs back to the nest, and just seven fish.

Nearly 7000 images were taken of the nest during the breeding season earlier this year using motion sensitive cameras.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/wildlife/11302220/Sea-eagles-eat-more-lamb-than-fish-despite-their-name-according-to-research.html

The study, carried out under a Scottish Natural Heritage licence, recorded 117 prey items being taken to the nest between January and July, nearly 70 of which were unidentifiable.

A total of 21 mammals were identified, as well as 14 birds, seven fish and a number of lambs.

The camera trial was set up after farmers and crofters repeatedly complained that sea eagles were responsible for killing their lambs.

Crofters on the Gairloch peninsula said in 2008 that the controversial raptors, which have been the subject of a successful reintroduction programme in Scotland, took 200 lambs in a single season.

Earlier this year, Willie Fraser, a crofter from the area, told a cross-party Hoyrood group earlier this year that some people had reduced the number of sheep they were keeping and others had given up altogether.

The trial is likely to be extended to other nests in 2015 to get a wider picture of what the birds are eating.

A sea eagle “steering group”, including representatives from SNH, the National Farmers’ Union, the Forestry Commission and the RSPB, has been set up in a bid to balance the needs of sheep farmers and crofters with the conservation of sea eagles.

A number of local “stakeholder groups” are also being established, covering areas including Mull, Argyll, Lochaber, Skye and Wester Ross.

Lachie Maclean, chairman of the Mull/Argyll/Lochaber group, said the photographs gave objective information on the number of lamb carcasses being brought to the nest and how often it occurred compared to other food sources.

He added that the survey provided a better idea of when lambs were most likely to be taken by sea eagles.

The group agreed cameras should be used at other nests next year, and that attempts to divert the attention of sea eagles from lambing areas should be trialled, including the use of scaring devices and diversionary feeding.

Earlier this year, SNH claimed the predation of lambs by the birds of prey was not widespread. But according to farmers in Argyll, there is now one lamb-eating sea eagle for every sheep farm in their area.

In May, Britain's biggest raptor was photographed in the skies over the Ardnamurchan peninsula carrying a lamb to its eyrie.

Read the article HERE.

19/12/2014: Australian fish and chips may be subject to country-of-origin labelling

An Australian Senate review of seafood labelling laws has called for takeaway shops and restaurants to be required to state which countries fish comes from, the Guardian reports.

The rural and regional affairs and transport references committee recommended that the hospitality industry have 12 months until the “mandated extension of seafood country-of-origin labelling would be enforced”.

The committee’s report said the adoption of such labelling would “not be onerous” to the industry, citing the existing regime in the Northern Territory which requires prepared seafood be labelled “imported” if it is from another country.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/dec/19/seafood-country-of-origin-labelling-may-be-extended-to-fish-and-chip-shops

Elsewhere in Australia, supermarkets or fish markets selling uncooked fish must have country-of-origin labelling but there is an exemption to these rules for restaurants, fish and chip shops and other takeaways.

An extension of labelling laws has been backed by environmentalists behind the Label My Fish campaign, certain fishers, the Greens and the independent senator Nick Xenophon, who wants the name “barramundi” protected so it can only apply to Australian-caught fish.

Pavo Walker, a commercial tuna fisherman from Queensland, said: “A tuna caught in the high seas by a vessel from Europe or Asia is a different prospect to one caught by a commonwealth fisherman in Australia.

“We need proper seafood labelling so the Australian fishing industry can distinguish its product from imports and reap the proper rewards for complying with a high level of regulation.”

Matt West, president of the Australian Prawn Farmers Association, said: “Next Christmas all seafood lovers should know exactly what they are buying. I am delighted that at last a powerful Senate inquiry has finally found the political will to make a firm recommendation in the consumers and the national interest.”

The Greens senator Peter Whish-Wilson said still more should be done to protect the sustainability of Australia’s fisheries.

“The inquiry’s recommendations, whilst a step in the right direction, could still go further to achieving better ocean sustainability outcomes, which are long-term requirements for both the marketplace and marine stewardship,” he said.

“On the evidence presented at the inquiry, the Greens recommend a staged approach that would go beyond country-of-origin labelling by requiring mandatory fish naming standards, and sustainability and provenance labelling.”

Whish-Wilson said a bill would be presented to parliament in 2015 on seafood labelling. The government has yet to indicate its response to the committee’s report.

Read the article HERE.

19/12/2014: New record depth for deepest fish

A new record has been set for the world's deepest fish, the BBC reports.

The bizarre-looking creature, which is new to science, was filmed 8145m beneath the waves, beating the previous depth record by nearly 500m.

Several other new species of fish were also caught on camera, as well as huge crustaceans called supergiants.

The animals were discovered during an international expedition to the Mariana Trench, which lies almost 11km down in the Pacific Ocean.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-30541065

The 30-day voyage took place from the Schmidt Ocean Institute's research vessel, Falkor, and is the most comprehensive survey of world's deepest place ever undertaken.

The Hadal Ecosystem Studies (Hades) team deployed unmanned landers more than 90 times to depths that ranged between 5000m and 10,600m. They studied both steep walls of the undersea canyon.

Dr Jeff Drazen, co-chief scientist from the University of Hawaii, US said: "Many studies have rushed to the bottom of the trench, but from an ecological view that is very limiting.

"It's like trying to understand a mountain ecosystem by only looking at its summit."

The University of Aberdeen's Hadal Lander - the UK's deepest diving vehicle - recorded more than 100 hours of deep-sea footage.

Until this expedition, the deepest fish had been found in the Japan Trench, also in the Pacific Ocean. A 17-strong shoal of pink gelatinous snailfish (Pseudoliparis amblystomopsis) were recorded 7700m down.

Dr Alan Jamieson, from Oceanlab at the University of Aberdeen said: "After we found these, we started seeing them in other deep trenches. Each trench has its own snailfish species.

"And we saw one in the Mariana Trench at more than 8000m and we think it's a new species."

The team thought they had broken the deepest-fish record, but then another pale pink species came to feed at the lander, which is loaded with bait, even further down at 8145m.

Dr Jamieson said: "We think it is a snailfish, but it's so weird-looking; it's up in the air in terms of what it is.

"It is unbelievably fragile and when it swims, it looks like it has wet tissue paper floating behind it.

"And it has a weird snout - it looks like a cartoon dog snout."

Without catching the fish and bringing it back to the surface the team is unable to confirm that it is a new species, but Dr Jamieson said it did not look like anything he'd seen before or knew of.

The new record-breaking creature is close to the depth-limit at which scientists believe fish can survive.

They researchers also captured another bizarre species - supergiants - on camera.

These creatures are a type of amphipod, which are normally around 2-3cm long. The super-sized version can reach up to 30cm.

Dr Jamieson said: "We've got more than 20 hours of footage of them, and we're learning the way they swim, the way they feed and the way they fend off predators.

"They clamp down on the bait, and bore their head into it and put their spiky tail in the air like a thorn bush.

"Anything that goes for it gets stabbed in the nose."

The dives made during the expedition were all conducted by unmanned vehicles, but humans have visited the world's deepest place.

In 1960 US Navy Lt Don Walsh and Swiss oceanographer Jacques Piccard made an incredibly risky journey to the bottom of the Mariana Trench in a bathyscaphe called the Trieste.

And in 2012 Hollywood director James Cameron made a solo descent to the seafloor in his sub called the Deepsea Challenger.

He described the place as a desolate, alien world.

Read the article HERE.

Thursday, December 18, 2014

Wenger company profile

From small-town entrepreneur to worldwide leader. With a little ingenuity and a lot of hard work, brothers Joe and Louis Wenger founded Wenger Mixing Company in a small town in Kansas, USA 1935. They went on to design a machine that blended molasses with dry feedstuffs and produced pellets in 1948.

Theirs was the first extrusion cooking system and the basic technology for all commercial extruders used today. The Wenger brothers' novel idea created a worldwide industry. And 75 years later Wenger Manufacturing Inc is still a family-owned business committed to groundbreaking innovation in the extrusion market.

Read the article HERE.

18/12/2014: Bangladeshi shrimp farmers staring at losses

Bangladeshi shrimp farmers and processors have sunk into hard times after a slump in demand and depreciation of major importers' currencies, the Daily Star reports.

Industry operators said many buyers have pushed back the shipment of their orders, while a section of them are even seeking discounts. As a result, stockpiles are rising at the processors' end.

“It is a very bad situation. Prices are falling fast, while sales are down. The business has been dormant for the past two months,” said Khan Habibur Rahman, deputy managing director of Lockpur Group, one of the main shrimp processors.

The ample production of vannamei shrimp in India and Vietnam has been blamed for the most part for the slump in demand for the locally-grown black tiger shrimp.

http://www.thedailystar.net/shrimp-farmers-staring-at-losses-55912

“Exporters in these countries are offering very low prices,” Rahman said.

A pound of black tiger shrimp is now selling for US$6.50, which was US$9.20 as recently as two months ago, said Shoyeb Mahmud, general manager of Jahanabad Seafood Ltd.

“I doubt if the farmers will be able to break even, but the small ones will definitely be hit hard.”

So dire is the situation that many buyers are renegotiating prices of already placed orders, he said, adding that stocks are piling up in almost every factory. The sinking euro and the recent slide of Russian rouble against the US dollar have added salt to the injury.

The rouble has lost 60 percent of its value against the dollar since the beginning of the year, hit by Western sanctions over Russian's support for the separatist insurgency in Ukraine and the fall in oil price.

The two currencies' slide increased the import costs in Europe and Russia, which together account for nearly 75 percent of the country's shrimp exports, said Md Amin Ullah, president of the Bangladesh Frozen Foods Exporters Association (BFFEA).

“We are completely stuck. Many buyers have totally stopped buying. And the tension in Ukraine instigated by Russia has compounded our woes,” he said, adding that many of the buyers have asked local processors to halt the shipment of previous placed orders and some have even withdrawn orders.

Although shrimp exports started the fiscal year on a good note, it began falling in the latter months. Between July and November, it raked in US$276 million, down 4.55 percent year-on-year, according to Export Promotion Bureau.

“Come the end of December, the decline might be 15 percent,” the BFFEA president said.

The sector logged in US$550 million in exports last fiscal year, a 21 percent rise from the previous year.

The sector provides livelihood for 833,000 farmers who cultivate shrimp on 275,000 hectares of land in the coastal areas of the southwest, according to the Department of Fisheries.

“All of us, from large farmers to small ones, are counting huge losses because of the price collapse,” said Mohammad Shah Alam Sheikh, a shrimp farmer from the Chandpai union under Mongla, the southwestern coastal sub-district.

Read more HERE.

18/12/2014: New Zealand's Hauraki Gulf aquaculture a boon to the region

Above the waters of the Hauraki Gulf, a marine farm might appear only a tidy row of racks, or a small bunch of ropes and buoys dotted against the blue.

But below the surface lie unseen clusters of oysters or mussels - and the hope for a sustainable economy potentially worth hundreds of millions of dollars more to the Auckland and Waikato regions, the New Zealand Herald reports.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11376241

Aquaculture in the gulf is becoming increasingly important not just for New Zealand's primary industry economy, but for the wellbeing of the communities that depend on its survival.

With nurture, the industry forecasts nationwide growth of aquaculture in New Zealand could reach NZ$1 billion by 2025.

Much of that growth would come from the gulf, which presently provides nearly 60 percent of the country's farmed oysters and a quarter of its mussels.

Their combined value in the gulf is worth around NZ$60 million, contributing to the economy around NZ$170 million and providing more than 900 jobs in the region.

"When people talk about 'the economy' I think they have a picture of large companies in big cities," said Callum McCallum, a long-time leader in the oyster industry and chairman of Sea Change's aquaculture roundtable.

"But aquaculture provides jobs and turnover in coastal communities that really need them, like Coromandel and Clevedon - so when we talk about 'economy' we're talking about benefits to local people in the Hauraki Gulf."

In the gulf today, there are over 1270 hectares of mussel and oyster farms - the equivalent space of around 1270 international rugby fields.

The oyster industry took off from the moment in the early 1970s that marine farmers in Mahurangi Harbour, north of Auckland, discovered a new type of oyster growing among the native rock oysters they'd traditionally farmed.

The Pacific oyster, thought to have been carried to New Zealand on the hulls of freighters from Japan, was first seen as a nuisance by farmers who tried to eradicate it. But as it could grow three times bigger and faster than its native counterpart, it soon became an industry mainstay.

In 2010 a herpes virus nearly wiped out the country's Pacific oysters, but industry breeding programmes helped it recover.

The industry also now has its own oyster hatchery and is working to develop a herpes-resistant strain, Mr McCallum said.

"The natural spat has also become more resistant to the virus, so after four poor years, we are starting to produce better volumes of oysters."

By the end of the 1970s, the first mussel farm had been established at Waiheke Island, before mussel farming in the Coromandel began in the early 1980s. The relatively clean waters of the gulf were ideal for oysters and mussels, which as filter feeders pump out water after sucking in tiny drifting plants.

Mr McCallum said because they performed a service in the ecosystem, there wasn't a clash of environment and economy.

"The industry has carried out a lot of research to prove that aquaculture in the gulf has very little negative effect on the environment and is hugely beneficial for water quality."

According to the results of a Colmar Brunton survey commissioned by the Ministry for Primary Industries this year, most New Zealanders agree.

73 percent had positive views of aquaculture, while 91 percent believed New Zealand should look for opportunities to sustainably grow the industry.

As mussel farms acted like artificial reefs and attracted snapper and other fish, aquaculture had also attracted fishing and charter fishing boats.

"That means more jobs and more income for local communities," Mr McCallum said.

The Auckland region has about 251 hectares of existing marine farms, and last year there were applications under way for a further 4600 hectares for farms and spat catching.

Most of these are in the western Firth of Thames, and about half of them were transferred to the Waikato Regional Council when the boundaries were re-aligned.

The 1900 hectares of space allocated in Waikato includes farms already operating. Nearly 400 hectares for finfish farming have also been allocated.

Those who apply for consent from councils must prove their operation will have little environmental impact, as well as undergoing an undue adverse effects test required by the Ministry for Primary Industries.

Farms are also regularly checked for ‘trigger points’ that can signal environmental concerns, such as water quality and what animals are living on the floor beneath the farms.

Environmental groups have expressed specific worries, including whether there was enough water movement around farms or if they could negatively affect other species.

Despite the relatively tiny area that farms make up in the gulf, there have been some rare cases of threatened Bryde's whales becoming entangled in mussel spat collecting lines.

"In the past we've been engaged in endless debates about where marine farms should go and where they shouldn't, but now we are looking at the big picture and seeing the benefits to the environment and to coastal communities," Mr McCallum said.

The roundtable's aim had been to determine the role, needs and impact of aquaculture in the gulf.

"The process has been really encouraging because for the first time, we have people from every viewpoint around the same table talking positively about the industry, its benefits and its future in a sustainable world," he said.

"One of the key needs for aquaculture is research and experimental provisions that allow the industry to test the benefits and effects of farming new species. "And the gulf would be an ideal location."

Read the article HERE.

18/12/2014: US alumnus finds solutions for food insecurity through aquaponics

During a routine stop at the grocery store, Miles Medina had a random thought, FIU News reports. Why couldn’t the store grow the very produce it sells on its roof?

That random thought led Medina to explore the world of aquaponics, a journey that has earned him first place for his master’s thesis in ‘Outstanding Thesis in Food and Agricultural Science Competition’ hosted by the US Department of Agriculture-National Institute of Food and Agriculture (USDA-NIFA), American Association of Hispanics for Higher Education (AAHHE), and Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi.

http://news.fiu.edu/2014/11/alumnus-finds-solutions-for-food-insecurity-through-aquaponics/82843

“After doing some research, I learned a start-up company based in New York City was trying to do just that with hydroponics. I looked into it and didn’t feel satisfied that hydroponics could reduce the negative environmental impacts associated with agriculture,” Medina said.
“Then I discovered aquaponics and became really interested in getting some hands-on experience and contributing to the research being done on it.”

Aquaponics is a food production system that integrates aquaculture, or raising aquatic animals in tanks, and hydroponics, or growing plants in water. A basic aquaponic system is made up of a fish tank, solids filter, biofilter and vegetable grow bed. Water is pumped from the fish tank to the solids filter where bits of waste are removed. The water then flows through the biofilter where naturally occurring bacteria break nutrients down into inorganic forms that feed the plants in the vegetable grow bed. Finally, the filtered water returns to the fish tank and the cycle continues. According to Medina, aquaponic farmers tend to rely on fish feeds that are rich in phosphorous and nitrogen and formulated for fish-only aquaculture.

“Although what the fish excrete is good fertilizer for the plants, it’s not perfect. Oftentimes, you end up having plants that eventually show certain nutrient deficiencies,” Medina said.

“That’s what motivated me to do this study. I wanted to compare the difference in how the plants grow based on the feed that’s given to the fish. No matter what, fish waste is always good fertilizer, but there’s always room for improvement. There’s always the opportunity to find what’s missing.”

Medina designed and built six aquaponic units at the FIU Organic Garden in order to compare the effects of two aquafeeds – one formulated for fish-only aquaculture and one plant-based feed formulated for aquaponic cultivation. Using blue tilapia and red amaranth, a nutritious leafy vegetable, Medina found aquaponic farmers can achieve higher crop yields using less nitrogen and phosphorous inputs. In other words, aquaponic farmers can produce more crops by using a plant-based feed formulated for aquaponics cultivation.

Medina also found the improved crop yield from the lower-protein aquafeed can
compensate for associated reductions in fish yield to increase total aquaponic farm revenue.

“As our global population increases and more of us live in cities, we have to find opportunities and develop new ways to provide for ourselves in a way that’s environmentally sustainable,” Medina said.

Read more HERE.

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Friday, December 19, 2014

Thursday, December 18, 2014