From: "Barlow, Chris" <BarlowC@prose.dpi.qld.gov.au>
To: AQUA-L
AQUACULTURE IN INLAND SALINE WATERS
QUESTION:
Australia has vast inland saline water resources. These can be grouped in 3 categories.
- natural saline lakes (often highly seasonal, and thus of varying
salinity);
- shallow aquifers, generally resulting from rising water tables on
agricultural land; and
- deep aquifers (chemically stable, formed from 'ancient' waters,
sometimes artesian).
Currently in Australia there is virtually insignificant use of inland
saline water for aquaculture - some brine shrimp production and one
barramundi farm (interestingly, using a deep aquifer with MgCl2 as the dominant salt).
There is, however, considerable interest from both private and public
agencies in developing inland saline water aquaculture, based on
perceived advantages such as:
- cheap land compared to coastal areas;
- limited (or no) conflict over use of the resource;
- enhanced quarantine capability;
- diversification, job and wealth creation in rural areas.
Consequently, a national workshop is being planned to:
- review current knowledge;
- assess culture potentials;
- identify key constraints or problem areas; and
- develop a national action plan for a coordinated approach to R & D
in the area.
My task is to review current knowledge. Can you help? Any references (journals, trade magazines), unpublished reports, or comments about activities on which there is presently no documentation would be great.
Chris Barlow
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COMMENTS 1:
My family rear shrimp larvae in Taiwan. They've been doing this for more than 20 years.
There are areas in Taiwan which have saline underground water like you mentioned. People there operate shrimp nurseries and shrimp ponds. The water is mostly brackish. So for monodon larvae hatcheries, it's not suitable. I am not sure, however, whether they have Machrobrachium rosenbergii hatcheries. But I do know for that they have Machrobrachium resenbergii nurseries there and they do very well.
From what I know, saline water of this type is only suitable for wide
salinity tolerance species.
Milk fish, and mud crabs do very well there as well.
Ray
<sandy221@ms10.hinet.net>
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COMMENTS 2:
Have you considered algae production? We are currently running a marine algal production system that is inland. Unfortunately we do not have access to a saltwater well, we have to mix up artificial seawater.
Sounds like you might have a prime location/opportunity to do algal
production in mass quantity without having to locate on the coast. Our system is capable of producing up to 1.5 to 2 kg per day of algal paste in a room that is 15m x 15m (roughly). If we had a saltwater well we could cut our costs by about half. If you would like more information on the algae system contact Dr. Kelly Rusch at krusch@unix1.sncc.lsu.edu and ask her about HISTAR.
Mike Christensen
<mchris@unix1.sncc.lsu.edu>
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COMMENTS 3:
Groundwater underlies some 60% of Australia and so is an important natural resource. The quality of the groundwater resource varies enormously and more than 20% is classified as being either brackish or saline. In the Goulburn Irrigation Area (GIA) (Shepparton, south eastern Australia) approximately 221,000 ML/year of mostly saline water is currently being pumped from relatively shallow aquifers (< 25m depth), for irrigation purposes and to mitigate the effect of rising water tables and associated increasing salinity levels.
For the past 2 years we have been undertaking mariculture trials in the form of a "scoping" exercise in 2 evaporation basins in the GIA as part of a project, which is being funded by the Murray-Darling Basin Commission, designed to evaluate the operation of a Serial Biological Concentration (SBC) system for management and utilisation of saline groundwaters. The SBC system concentrates saline water by irrigating salt tolerant shrubs and trees (15 plant species are being tested). The excess water is then collected in underground drains and pumped to a series of small evaporation basins where the salt is extracted through evaporation. This system is designed to offset costs of controlling saline groundwater problems by providing an economic return through potentially profitable enterprises such as integrated production of salt tolerant crops, commercial salt harvesting
and mariculture.
The 2 evaporation basins in which we have been culturing a range of
freshwater, estuarine and marine species vary in salinity. Pond 1 has a
salinity of 9-15 ppt (13700-24300 us/cm) while pond 2 is 10-25 ppt
(14800-38400 us/cm). The species that have been tested to date include Pacific Oyster (Crassostrea gigas), Sydney rock oyster (Saccostrea commercialis), leader prawn (Penaeus monodon), tiger prawn (P. japonicus), Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar), Australian bass (Macquaria novemaculata), black bream (Acanthopagrus butcheri), greenback flounder (Rhombosolea tapirina), rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss), sand whiting (Sillago ciliata) and silver perch (Bidyanus bidyanus)
Very interesting results are being obtained so far. For example, silver
perch, a freshwater species, grew exceptionally well in the low salinity
pond but died in the high salinity pond. Sand whiting survived in both
ponds, but did not grow while Atlantic salmon performed well in both ponds.
Of the invertebrates only Pacific oysters showed any promise. Salinities and/or temperatures were probably too low for the other invertebrates (some of these results have already been published in Austasia Aquaculture 10(2) 1996). Species that have not worked here should not be written off as the conditions (ionic concentration/composition, temperature etc.) in the 2 ponds represent only a small range of water quality conditions found in saline groundwaters throughout Australia. So, over the next 12 months we
hope to test more species in more sights, as well as undertake some
"scaled-up" growout trials on species which have shown promise in earlier trials.
In conclusion, the concept of integrated mariculture, agriforestry and
saline groundwater management is showing much promise. It is anticipated that more than 50 of these types of evaporation basins will need to be constructed in the GIA over the next decade to combat salinity problems. At this stage this would appear to offer great commercial opportunities.
Program Leader - Aquaculture R & D
Marine and Freshwater Resources Institute
Snobs Creek Fish Hatchery
Private Bag 20
Alexandra. VIC. 3714.
AUSTRALIA.
Telephone: (057) 74 2208
Fax: (057) 74 2659
Email: b.ingram@dce.vic.gov.au
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