Fish Hatchery Management - fisheries & aquaculture

FISH HA,I.CH ER.I' MANAL; EM FNTThe format of Fish Hatchery Management is functional: hatchery require,ments and operations; broodstock management and spawning; nutritionand feeding; fish health; fish transportation. We have tried to emphasizethe principles of hatchery culture that are applicable to many species offish, whether they are from warmwater, coolwater, or coldwater areas of thecontinent. Information about individual species is distributed through thetext; with the aid of the Index, a hatchery manager can assemble detailedprofiles of several species of particular interest.In the broad sense, fish culture as presented in Fish Hatchery Managementencompasses not only the classical "hatchery" with troughs and raceways(intensive culture), but also pond culture (extensive culture), and cage andpen culture (which utilizes water areas previously considered inappropriatefor rearing large numbers of fish in a captive environment). ttre coolwaterspecies, such as northern pike, walleye, and the popular tiger muskie, traditionallywere treated as warmwater species and were extensively reared indirt ponds. These species now are being reared intensively with increasingsuccess in facilities traditionally associated with salmonid (coldwater)species.We have no pretense of authoring an original treatise on fish culture.Rather, we have assembled existing information that we feel is pertinent togood fish hatchery management. We have quoted several excellent literaturesources extensively when we found we could not improve on theauthor's presentation. We have avoided literature citations in the text, buta bibliography is appended to each chapter. We have utilized unpublishedmaterial developed by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service; Dale D.Lamberton's use of length-weight tables and feeding rate calculations, andhis procedures for projecting fish growth and keeping hatchery recordshave been especially useful. Thomas L. Wellborn's information on fishhealth management greatly strengthened the chapter on that subject.Many people have helped us prepare this manual. Our special recognitionand appreciation go to Ms. Florence Jerome whose dedication anddiligent efforts in typing several manuscript drafts, and in formating tablesand figures, allowed us to complete the book.Roger L. Herman and the staff of the National Fisheries Research andDevelopment Laboratory, Wellsboro, Pennsylvania, supported the projectand assisted in preparation of the manuscript.We greatly appreciate review comments contributed by federal, state,university, and private people: James W. Avault; Jack D. Bayless; ClaudeE. Boyd; Earnest L. Brannon; Carol M. Brownl Keen Buss; Harold E. Calbert;James T. Davis; Bernard Dennison; Lauren R. Donaldson; RonaldW. Goede; Delano R. Graff; William K. Hershberger; John G. Hnath;Shyrl E. Hood; Donald Horak; Janice S. Hughes; William M. Lewis;David O. Locke; Richard T. Lovell; J. Mayo Martin; Ronald D. Mayo;