If you intend to go into catfish farming in Nigeria, the first thing you have to get hold of is the fingerlings. The fingerling can be obtained mainly through artificial propagation in the hatcheries through hormonal induction.
If you intend to produce your own fertilized eggs, you can make use of the homoplastic pituitary gland suspension.
In Nigeria, It is usually more affordable than the imported hormonal analogues. Fish Farmers also say that they are more reliable.
And I seriously don’t doubt them. But despite the beauty of induced
spawning, there the challenges which you must face: both biotic and abiotic challenges.
These problems all have there root in the extra care needed to be given to the fry during the first week of life.
In this regard, you have to battle with provision of zooplankton which serves as Feeds for the purpose of feeding of the larvae, fry and fingerlings thus playing a major role on their growth and survival.
There is also the problem of cannibalism, heavy predation by frogs/aquatic insects and the abiotic challenges such as water temperature, dissolved oxygen (>4.5mg/L-1), levels of ammonia.
The brood stock to use for the purpose of breeding should be between 0.3kg and 2kg.
