a cheap farmable eating-fish.
I think it may be possible to grow them in rice paddies? I’m still looking into it. Sort of like a multi-phylum Companion Planting.Aha- FISH-RICE CULTURE
One thing I’ve noticed that is usually considered a disadvantage of this system, which actually is a bonus- you can’t use pesticides on the rice when you grow it concurrently with tilapia.
In an article from the The lsraeli Joumal of Aquaculture – Bamidgeh 50(1), 1998, 33-42:
CULTURE OF MACROBRACHIUM ROSENBERGII
IN MONOCULTURE AND POLYCULTURE
WITH OREOCHROMIS NILOTICUS IN PADDIES IN EGYPT
They found that a high density (in 7,200 m² paddies) prawn polyculture with the rice gave a higher return than a prawn/tilapia/rice polyculture or the control rice monoculture. Their most successful density: 20,000 prawn juveniles per hectareWeb link of note: American Tilapia Association
(At http://ag.arizona.edu/azaqua/ata.html)