Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I've been cycling for about 2 weeks now but don't want to buy fingerlings until the system has fully cycled.
Couldn't catch a catfish for the life of me (Murphy's Law) so tonight I went out to catch a bream or 3 to convert over to freshwater for these early days.
Caught one around 30cm and decided to try it first so I brought it straight home.
Came here and saw that EB had done similar many moons ago so I'm pretty hopeful.
I put it into 2 parts AP water to 1 part saltwater and added an aerator and sat quietly to look for signs of stress.
5 minutes later I could have sworn it was playing in the bubble stream so I held the airstone to the bottom of the tub properly and the fish swam up, appeared to stare at and then nudged my hand and proceeded to play beside it in the bubbles!
So an hour and a half later I siphoned out about 2/5 of the water and added more AP water and the bream still seems alright.
Not thrilled about it's small home right now I'm sure but it doesn't seem overly stressed.
If it's still well I'll put it in the FT tomorrow and it can get to work. Might have to go out and get a couple more friends for it.
Really nice night for it. No moon or wind and cold enough to keep most of the crowd away. Perfect.

Well done, Bodgy! What type of bream is it - black, silver, yellowfin, pikey, western spotted lesser swallowtail?

I think OBO tried it years ago too, from memory they kept dieing but hope you have more success

It is a Yellowfin/Eastern Black Bream PLJ, over here on the east coast we only really have the one main species and they're called them both those names.
We do have Pikey Bream too (which are actually blackish in colour ) and Tarwhine as well which are something else again. To be honest it can get confusing, people from all over the country and elsewhere live here so you hear all sorts of names thrown around.

Thanks for the heads up Charlie, I'll keep the FT salted to at least 3ppm but probably 4ppm to give the fish more chance.
It's been in the FT all morning and so far all is well. Fingers crossed!

And in case anyone is interested, during my research I found this page which gives approximate weight for length of some common species from NSW.
It includes Trout, Golden Perch, Murray Cod and Bass as well as Bream.

http://www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/fisheries/rec ... ater/weigh

I swear if we ever need rain I just need to plan to go fishing or to do some serious work on a car. Almost without fail...

And I'd just discovered a great new spot for a late-night, high tide fishing session too.
Oh well, the poor old bream will have to be lonely for the time being.

I kept a bream in my old AP system for about a year as an experiment. I found I had to keep the water constantly salted (1-2ppm), otherwise it would often get sick with fungal infections etc a lot particularly over winter, whilst the other silvers in the same tank were fine. But these were just my basic observations perhaps it can be done?

Thanks for your thoughts and experiences Jono.
I'm hoping it does alright for a month or two. I'm only planning to keep it in there that long, basically just to finish up the initial cycling and to keep the system plodding along until i spend some $$$ on fingerlings.
Sitting around 2.5ppt salt so fingers crossed there.
I noticed today that its pectoral fins have deteriorated but no fungal growth. It might just be damage from capture if I'm lucky. As soon as I see fungus I'll pull the pin on the experiment.
I was going to cull it then I noticed that the five little goldfish seem to have vanished so I'll give it another chance. If it deteriorates at all I'll put it on a plate though, rather than stress it any more.
If it is feeding it has a chance though.
I really need to catch some small yabbies and some shrimp for a more natural diet. Goldfish are a bad choice of food for Oscars and maybe the same holds for bream? Mind you, for only a couple of months it shouldn't cause any problems.

I have removed the small wild caught feeder fish though, the pectoral fin damage was only apparent after adding them. I have some suspicions...

Quick update on the Bream.
It's still doing quite well and feeding when I'm not around.

When I roll back the temporary cover over 2/3 of the FT opening it comes over for a look but it hides when I remove it fully.
Still chubby and no sign of it weakening or getting crook at this stage. Still crossing my fingers there.
Annoyingly I haven't managed to catch it any friends yet despite it being solidly into bream 'season' but I might head out tonight and try again. Being a schooling fish I'm sure it would be happier with a little buddy or two...

I'm so gunna try this, I reckon a tarwine would be similar.

It's possible with bream since they move into brackish/almost fresh water to breed in winter. Right up into ridiculously shallow and narrow waters.
Tarwhine apparently also breed in estuaries during winter so it might just work with them too. From what I just read they spawn in river mouths though. For some reason they strike me as a saltwater fish, probably because of their bright silver colour.
Was really hoping to be hand feeding my bream by now. One day perhaps. Mind you, it might smart a bit if those oyster crushing teeth grabbed a finger. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Once I caught a fish alive... )
I am pretty tempted to run my system with locally caught fish and just replace them as I harvest them. Within bag limits of course. Oh, it turns out that the bag for bream is 30 fish in QLD. So no problem there in my single IBC system!
I'm impatient and as long as it isn't overly cruel to them it would ensure a reasonably constant harvest. Assuming that I can catch them of course.
And if some are feed trained it'll encourage the new ones.
Otherwise dead feeder and baitfish seem to be doing the trick. (I'm suss they might be fin nippers so no more live ones in there from now on. I missed a few when I evicted them but the few remaining are gradually disappearing from the FT). Cast netting a few herring every now and again would do the trick too I reckon as a nice cheap (um, free) AP feed. They should be high in omega oils too thanks to their diet and I know bream love them.
The dead feeders occasionally get stuck on the pump inlet and it seems to be a nice "all you can eat" buffet for my little mate since they vanish reasonably fast.
Crap... it's not my mate... it's a future meal... Will NOT name this fish. Although it might be the feed trained fish to comfort the newly added ones. Would be cool to grow it to 60cm over the next decade or two. It is probably already 7 years old at 30cm+.
Hope it continues to do well.

From what I just found online they are around 17 years old at 60cm/4kg.
Not a serious idea though, I'm just being silly but it'd be pretty sweet to have one that large. The biggest elbow slapper I've caught would have been lucky to have been 45cm, can only imagine one at 60!
Would need a larger FT for sure if I was mad enough to do it.
(I'm not really mad enough to do it though).

Unless I get asked a question on this thread I'll be talking about my bream in my system thread from here on in, just to keep my posts more coherent. (viewtopic.php?f=18&t=19779&hilit=bream) And maybe a final comment after harvest I guess, to report on whatever seems relevant.

As for now, my concerns for its fins have passed, it seems to be in the pink of health (it isn't actually pink...) and is loving peeled green prawns from the supermarket for a feed ration. I'm hoping it will start to eat the pellets that I add to the system but with the prawns available I don't think that's likely. I've given up on the idea of feeder fish, too expensive by far at the rate they get eaten.
The clear water and the light colour of the IBC seem to have really brought out the silver in the fish too. It's looking great.
Been back out fishing half a dozen times since, trying to catch some tankmates for it but I can't catch a bream in the middle of bream season for some irritating reason, maybe the millions upon millions of tiny shrimp or immature prawns that are swarming at the moment are putting them off other baits?
Ahh well, the one that I have is doing well at least, maybe 2 1/2 weeks in or so, running at just under 3ppt salt.