Murray cod farmers take a leap into aquaculture venture
There was only one way for novice Murray cod farmers Keith Pickmere and wife Susie to dive in at the deep end.
IN A giant leap of faith Keith Pickmere sunk a dam on his 5ha citrus block to farm Murray cod, knowing nothing about aquaculture.
Fast forward three years and Keith and wife Susie are on the verge of doubling their production.
Their farm is situated at Yoogali, near Griffith, in the NSW Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area, 8km east of the Bilbul fish farm of pioneering Murray cod farmer Mat Ryan.
Mat founded a burgeoning aquaculture venture, now operating as Murray cod Australia Limited, in 2012.
The ASX-listed company operates fish farms and a hatchery, marketing produce under the Aquna label.
Keith said the opportunity to be his own boss after 40 years in corporate management, together with sustainable farming practices, was the lure for him to join the industry.
“We are one of seven contract suppliers to Murray cod Australia,” Keith said.
“We get fingerlings at 100 grams and grow them out to 1.2kg. This takes about 18 months.
“The first dam is fully stocked with 24,000 fish.
KEITH AND SUSIE PICKMERE
YOOGALI, NSW
STARTED farming Murray cod three years ago
ONE of 10 contract suppliers to Murray cod Australia
GET fingerlings at 100g and grow them out to 1.2kg
FISH are sold to top-end restaurants in Sydney and Melbourne
“We have built a second dam which will be partly stocked this month and fully stocked by March next year.”
The fish growing in the Pickmeres’ dam are destined for top-end restaurants in Sydney and Melbourne. Closer to home the Murray cod are served to customers by an award-winning chef in a fine-dining restaurant at Griffith.
REEL DEAL
IN preparation for the Murray cod, Keith cleared some citrus trees to make way for dams, replaced drip-irrigation lines and installed pumps to pump nutrient-rich water from the dams to the orchard to irrigate citrus trees which are now thriving.
He said the citrus production was small. All the trees are valencias and yield about 250 tonnes annually.
“We have a two-megalitre high security water entitlement and a six-megalitre general security entitlement,” Keith said.
“We still have to buy water which is costly at present, but we are only topping up the loss from evaporation.
“All the water is recycled to the orchard. There is no waste.”
The set-up cost for the Murray cod enterprise was $300,000.
“I hope for a return in five years, but it may take longer. There is a lot to learn,” Keith said.
“We did most of the work ourselves and had generous help from friends.”
Drawing on his farming skills, Keith welded steel walkways, attached floats, equipped a shipping container as a testing laboratory and erected predator-proof netting to deter opportunistic cormorants from grabbing an easy meal.
Four submersible aeration pumps and two paddle wheels aerate water into nets where the fish grow.
Each net contains 3000 fish.
“The nets are two metres deep and the dam is five metres deep,” Keith said. “It is important to keep the fish off the bottom of the dam to avoid a muddy taste.”
The Pickmeres budget for an annual fish mortality rate of 10 per cent.
DIVERSIFICATION TO TAME WILD WEST
BREATHING SPACE
MAINTAINING the right oxygen level and constant monitoring of both fish and water are of paramount importance.
“Water temperature is ideal between 16C and 28C. During winter the fish go dormant,” Keith said.
The fish feed bought from Tasmania is placed into hoppers that deliver feeds during the night.
Keith said feed, fingerlings and electricity were the biggest inputs. But solar panels on the house and shed can drive one dam during daylight hours, which helps to reduce the power costs.
“We test the water every two to three days. We also test for parasites and take skin and gill samples from the fish twice a week,” Keith said.
Other hazards are horticultural sprays. Keith said neighbouring growers were mindful of the danger of spray drift and sprayed only when wind was blowing away from the dam.
Keith and Susie, parents of three adult children, see a bright future for their enterprise and farmed Murray cod in general with the fish commanding a high price and demand far outstripping supply.
SERVE IT UP
SOME of their produce finds its way to their own table. So what is a favourite Murray cod dish?
“It can be prepared in many ways. We like our fish smoked and made into a pate or shallow-fried with a light coating of rice flour,” Keith said.
The Pickmeres can take a bow for some of the MCA achievements with Aquna Sustainable Murray cod winning the Excellence in Sustainability Award in the NSW Business Chamber Murray-Riverina Awards, earning a berth in next month’s NSW finals.
Exports are also in sight with Australian farm-raised Murray cod available in the US through San Francisco-based sustainable seafood company CleanFish.
Australia’s biggest native freshwater fish, the Murray cod is listed by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature as critically endangered.
A NSW Government restocking program supported by Murray cod Australia is under way to help ensure the survival of the famed fish in its Murray-Darling Basin heartland.
More than a million Murray cod fingerlings raised in the MCA hatchery have been released into the river system.
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