Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi all,

I've just had an interesting conversation with one of the guys from Vebas (an aquarium shop here in Perth) about suitable fish to co-habit with my Yabbies and Marron.

As the months have started to warm up I have had an increasing number of mosquitos laying eggs in my tanks outside. I have been fishing them manually out and feeding them to my goldies up until now, but this has started to get painful (especially in the Marron tanks which have wire meshing), and I haven't been bothering as often lately. The result - swarms of mozzies!

Goldies are susceptible to being caught by the Yabbies and probably wouldn't last very long at all with the Marron, as they prefer to sleep at night (when the crays are most active).

The guy from Vebas consulted with one of the other dudes there and suggested Western Pygmy Perch. Apparently they have had these fish living with the Yabbies in the same tanks without incident.

http://www.nativefish.asn.au/westernpygmyperch.html

It looks very promising, particularly...

'May be fed daphnia, mosquito larvae, brine shrimp and other small live food. Will also take chopped earthworms."

Perfect, I have plenty of mozzie larvae and earthworms I can sacrifice if need be.

They won't eat the duckweed which I have been growing in the Yabby tanks as they are carnivores, they are hardy, and they are native to W.A.

I'm off to grab some tomorrow, will aim to get males and females in order to (hopefully) have a self sustaining population of them.

sounds good simmo,

i also plan to work with west australian natives. the only problem for me has been sourcing them.

come marron season i will be going on a road trip down south and plan to bring back as many species as possible.

good luck with them simmo.

You can also try rainbowfish, there are a couple of WA species. Look here to see what you can find http://members.optushome.com.au/chelmon/Contents.htm

we've got Eastern Rainbowfish from the creek who should do some of the job for us.

thanks for that link jaymie,

lots of useful info there.

I was just thinking, I don't know how they will go with the marron though.

I have seen them sleeping/still at night, might end up as marron food?

Yeah, that has been the problem with a number of potential candidates... Thanx for the link

I have swordtails living in my tank with 6 yabbies. I have only had one incident with the dominant male getting his 'sword' cut off. It was interesting to see how little attention he got from the females after that. I know they are not natives, but they are excellent mozzie control.

pretty much and fish that is fast enouggh to avoid the marron. Having a deeper tank for dual occupancy of yabbies or marron + fish is always a plus, as the fish will learn to stay in the upper zone.

You could always keep a silver perch or two in with them, just let it feed off the mozzies. it will stay small for ages unless you bulk it up with feed

Ahhh, interesting. The silvers at Vebas are expensive tho and "require fisheries approval". EB - did you ever get anywhere with the fisheries dept on that one?

They will definitely be the first fish species I try, I have been searching for some info on cohabitation of silver perch and marron that was produced by a scientist at Curtin Uni here in Perth, Dr Glen Whisson.

Check out the publications section about halfway down.

http://muresk.curtin.edu.au/staff/glen/index.html

Marron and Silvers in a medium sized aqua system is something I want to attempt.

Damn, I though vebas was the way to go... not if I need fisheries approval. Do the same rules apply for the bream and barra there.

I didn't need fisheries approval for the silvers I got from Arcadia Aquaculture.

I also noticed a nursery on Farrell road in Midvale that had a sign up on the weekend saying they had native WA fish for mozzie control in ponds. Didn't have time to stop to check it out though.

I would imagine that because he is a breeder/supplier he may be outside the loop of these regulations, but it is an interesting point. I am after a few maybe 5 or 6 silvers/jades/Black Bream to go into my 6 foot aquarium. If I hurry up with my big system I won't need to worry about vebas, just buy in bulk.

cool fizzyj, i'm out that way tommorow so will have a look.

i'll let you know.