Disease control in hatchery fish

Abstract

A direct method for controlling diseases among hatchery fish has long been sought as an alternative to the earlier technique of hand dipping. A simple, practical, effective method of direct pond treatment not only obviates all need for handling fish weakened by disease, but it would materially reduce the time and effort required by hatcherymen in keeping diseases under control. Furthermore, a direct pond treatment could be used for routine prophylaxis to eradicate diseases during their incipient stages--long before their presence becomes apparent. Several methods for applying direct pond treatments in coldwater-fish culture have been proposed. Kingsbury and Embody (1932) developed a technique for applying disinfectants directly to the inflowing water of a pond. Later, Fish (1939) advocated a method involving the recirculation of a disinfecting solution through a fish pond. For various reasons, neither of these methods proved to be an effective answer to the problem of controlling hatchery diseases and neither became widely adopted. The method described herein has been extensively tested, both in the laboratory and at the producing hatchery, over a period of several years. Once familiarity with the details of application have been mastered, th8 reduction in effort required to treat fish is amazing. For example, two men have treated 20 large ponds containing several million fish, in one morning with no significant increase in mortality of the fish, whereas a crew of eight men required a full day to treat a single similar pond by hand dipping the fish with a subsequent loss approximating 50 percent of the stock.