Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I know how tricky Raccoons can be but I don't think they would have put everything back how they found it when they were done, I would really expect to have seen signs of disturbance.

Hum.

As to the disease situation, as I've said, there were other deaths of fish with what looked like some sort of wounds or bugged out eyes or wasting around the mouth and whiskers etc. and probably 30% of the fish have barbs that look like the fin has separated from them.

But on an up note, the tilapia are breeding!!!!!

pictures of cover.

A critter could definitely get through the cover and the netting but I expect I would see the disturbance to it.

Ok, now most of the fingerlings are showing signs of heavy scraping on the sides/bottom as if all terribly stressed out (like has sometimes happened to the remaining fish after a couple days of heavy harvesting.) This (whatever disease it is they get when stressed like this) has killed a couple of my fish before while most of them seemed to recover in time. Anyway, the fish were fine last night as far as I could tell (unless it was me netting babies out of the shallow end away from the cage that stressed them out but I doubt it.)

Back to the critter idea for the injury to that one poor catfish. I'm not wondering if something was in there at feeding time this morning (6:30 am) since most of their morning feed was still floating when I got out to check on them. I still didn't see any major signs of disturbance to the cover so whatever it was, is small enough to manage without causing damage.

Sigh

What is the cage made of? Could they be scraping fins (especially barbs) on it when thrashing around in a squabble? Is there any way the gill fellow could have hooked himself on loose/projecting wire?

My condolences...

The cage is pvc and poly netting. No wires.

Small sneeky .....,, RAT ???

A rat could be getting in and out of that tank. However that fish was not much smaller than the rats we have here.

I can see that skinning barbs, but not causing that gill area injury. Perhaps, though, it might have somehow tangled a gill edge on the netting and ripped it the gill a bit, then the other fish did the rest? Step 1 would be testable with a dead fish....

Hopefully we won't have any more of those. Dead fish that is.

I heard you guys in Florida have a huge python problem. They just caught one that was 15 feet and they said it was large enough to take down a deer. They said that it was a real concern because they could get large enough to take down your endangered puma. If you have those large cattle panel openings with no chicken wire covering it, that may be your problem. Pythons are very stealthy so not much would be disturbed.
Try using a heavy dusting of flour around your tanks and see if you can see any disturbance. It might not work though if you have heavy morning dew. Otherwise it may be a long billed bird such as an egret that can reach through.

I've not heard of pythons managing to do well where I am in inland central FL but I'm sure released pets are a big problem down in South Florida. If we are having a python problem I would expect to be loosing chickens too so I'll keep my eyes open for signs. The humidity here generally means the dew falls with a thud though. We do have a couple rat snakes probably living back by the shed though, how interested in water are rat snakes? I'm just hoping they don't become interested in chicken eggs.