Barramundi (Asian Seabass) Farming: A Production Guide
How barramundi (Lates calcarifer) is farmed: catadromous, euryhaline, protandrous biology, pond and cage culture, hatchery larviculture with grading against cannibalism, feeding and growth.
Overview
Barramundi, known as Asian seabass in much of Asia (Lates calcarifer), is an important tropical and subtropical aquaculture fish farmed in Australia and across Southeast Asia. A member of the family Latidae, it is widely distributed in the Indo-West Pacific. Its farming began in Thailand in the 1970s and spread quickly because the species is hardy, fecund, and easy to wean onto pelleted feed.
Reproductive and habitat biology
Barramundi is catadromous, living and growing in fresh and brackish water but migrating to the sea to spawn, and it is euryhaline, tolerating salinities from fresh water to full seawater. It is also a protandrous hermaphrodite: most individuals mature first as males and change to females after one or more spawning seasons. Spawning in captivity is induced mainly through control of salinity and temperature, and the high fecundity of females supplies abundant hatchery seed.
Culture systems
- Freshwater and brackish ponds: widely used across Southeast Asia.
- Sea cages and net pens: for marine and coastal grow-out.
- Recirculating aquaculture systems (RAS): used for intensive, temperature-controlled production, including outside the tropics.
- Tanks: for hatchery, nursery and intensive grow-out.
Hatchery, larviculture and cannibalism
Hatcheries rear the larvae on live feeds and wean them onto pellets, which barramundi accept readily. The most serious problem in the nursery is cannibalism: when fish of uneven size are held together, larger individuals eat smaller ones, with losses heaviest in the first couple of months at small sizes. FAO guidance is to grade fingerlings at least weekly and stock each size group separately to minimize these losses.
Feeding and growth
Barramundi is carnivorous and grown on high-protein formulated pellets, with juveniles taking zooplankton and adults eating crustaceans and fish in the wild. It grows well in warm water, with a culture temperature usually around 26 to 30 °C, and it grows fast: fish typically reach a market size of about 400 to 600 g within roughly 12 months and around 3 kg in 18 to 24 months, with accepted marketable sizes varying by market from a few hundred grams upward.
Main diseases and harvest
Important diseases of farmed barramundi include viral nervous necrosis (betanodavirus), bacterial vibriosis and photobacteriosis, and scale drop disease, along with various parasites. Good water quality, biosecurity, size grading and avoiding stress are the main defences. Fish are harvested from ponds by netting or draining and from cages by crowding and netting, then sold whole or as fillets.