Fishbox: growing of ornamental fish in vertical raceways in recirculation system

• Grant number: 19/22517-1
• Support type: Research Grants - Innovative Research in Small Business - PIPE
• Duration: September 01, 2020 - May 31, 2021
• Field of knowledge: Agronomical Sciences - Fishery Resources and Fishery Engineering - Aquaculture
• Principal Investigator: Otávio Mesquita de Sousa
• Grantee: Otávio Mesquita de Sousa
• Company: Otavio Mesquita de Sousa
• CNAE: Aqüicultura em água salgada e salobra ; Aqüicultura em água doce
• City: Ubatuba
• Assoc. researchers: Eduardo Gomes Sanches
• Associated scholarship(s): 20/13132-6 - Fishbox: growing of ornamental fish in vertical raceways in recirculation system, BP.PIPE

Abstract

São Paulo state is the largest ornamental fish trading center in Brazil. Alternatives to the intensive production of ornamental fish are aquarium systems (glass or acrylic) that rely on robust support racks and are difficult to clean and handle. Among the different formats for recirculating fish ponds, the raceway system can be an even more efficient alternative in reducing the space and volume used for rearing ornamental fish. Raceways are systems based on high exchange rate and water velocity, featuring a gutter shape through which water circulates. Our proposal is to develop a raceway pond for fish cultivation coupled with a water recirculation system (Fishbox). Our differential will be the possibility of verticalization of the cultivation units and the capacity of use with fresh and salt water, changing only the type of filtration equipment to be adopted. One of the objectives of the project is to evaluate the ability of fish to develop on the raceway at different densities. Three different densities will be tested: i) 5 fish per experimental unit; ii) 10 fish per experimental unit; iii) 20 fish per experimental unit. These treatments represent a twenty times greater optimization of the raceway hydraulic system, resulting in the following densities for the aquariums and raceways respectively: i) 0.25 and 5 fish / m3; ii) 0.5 and 10 fish / m3; iii) 1 and 20 fish / m3. Two similar experiments will be performed, initially with salt water and later with fresh water. The two experiments will last 45 days each. To evaluate the efficiency of the raceway system in relation to the maintenance capacity of marine ornamental fish, it will be used as a study object juveniles of the species Amphiprion ocellaris (clown fish). For the experiment with freshwater will be used juveniles of botia clown species (Chromobotia macracanthus). In parallel to the execution of the prototype experiments, a Fishbox project will be scaled to commercial scale. As a final result we aim to demonstrate that the product is a viable alternative that optimizes the breeding of marine and freshwater ornamental fish, standing extremely higher densities than those traditionally used in aquarium breeding. (AU)