Indigenous techno-vention to promote periphyton-based aquaculture

Considering the increasing demand for aquaculture production, semi-intensive and intensive cultures have already been established, but with enhanced cost of supplementary and complete feed and associated incidence of water quality deterioration due to accumulated nutrient loss, an alternative approach of periphyton-based aquaculture has been initiated. Periphyton-based aquaculture is a low-cost culture technique with less feed input and has been reported to support the high production of most cultured fish species. Apart from this, an improved level of water quality in periphyton-based aquaculture has also been reported. Even considering these advantages, periphyton-based aquaculture has not been implemented on a huge scale due to one major disadvantage: the stationary nature of the substrate on which the biofilm grows. For this reason, partial harvesting of the stock or regular management practices of the cultured pond is impossible as these require complete removal of the substrates. To solve this problem, a model with indigenous technical intervention has been proposed where any substrate, bio-degradable or non-biodegradable so far, used for periphyton-based aquaculture can be used. Though this model is handy using bamboo poles and split bamboos; other components like crushed sugarcane bagasse, paddy straw, and PVC pipes can also be incorporated into it.