Environmental Performance
Continuous monitoring of the environment in which your farm stock lives is essential in a healthy, thriving aquaculture company. Not only does such monitoring help to predict both growth and survival rates it also helps to refine the optimal use of production sites.
In addition, many facets of the public image of your farm, and therefore your products, depend on this issue and your response to public concerns.
Monitoring of certain physico-chemical parameters of the environment should be carried out routinely, depending on farm type. These include:
- Temperature
- Oxygen
- pH
- Salinity
- Algal blooms
Questions
Can your staff perform the following basic environmental monitoring procedures?
- Take water samples (inflow/outflow) correctly for analysis in a certified analytical laboratory for the following measurements
- Ammonia
- Nitrate/nitrite
- Phosphate
- BOD/COD
- Suspended solids
- Other trace elements and compounds-antibiotic or other chemical residues.
Can you effectively relate the effects of the parameters shown above on fish feeding, growth, health and downstream environmental effects?
Would further training in the monitoring or consequences of these parameters on stock performance be beneficial?
Are you aware of all of the legislation that exists on environmental issues?
Danger point
Failure to carry out continuous inspection of essential environmental parameters can have catastrophic consequences.
If you are not satisfied with your answers to any of the previous questions, there is a need for further training.
Training checklist
Training provision to improve environmental performance.
Environmental Performance
- Correct methods for monitoring the aquatic environment
- The effects of water quality on the performance of fish
- Methods of reducing predation on fish farms
- Plankton Monitoring
- Correct use and calibration of meters for monitoring environmental parameters e.g. dissolved oxygen, pH, temperature.