Yes, I earn a decent living by selling catfish fingerlings to fishermen

Most Christians do not eat catfish, referring to the Bible in Leviticus, which says, “Of all the creatures living in the water of the seas and the streams you may eat any that have fins and scales.” Catfish does not have scales.

But other fish types find catfish delicious and fishermen use its fingerlings as bait in deep waters of Lake Victoria. That is how Joel Aduma reaps big from his catfish farming.

Between 1996 and 2003, the retired primary school teacher was one of the most prolific tilapia fish farmers in Masana village at the border of Vihiga and Kisumu counties. But the Aduma, 65, suddenly changed and ventured into the little known clarias fish farming.

Clarias, commonly known as catfish, are a diverse group of ray-finned fish, named for their prominent barbels, which resemble a cat’s whiskers.

In Western, they are common in shallow streams, and mostly reproduce in natural environments during rainy seasons.

“Not many people like to eat this fish, but flexible Christians have no issue with it, and it is very delicious,” says Aduma.

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Having discovered the secret to running a successful catfish farming, Aduma, who learnt his skills while teaching at Sidika Primary School in Nyahera, Kisumu West, now focuses on propagation of catfish and selling the fingerlings when they are 21 days old.

“The fingerlings are on high demand. So I use the big catfish for propagation, while only a few are sold as food,” he says, adding that more fish farmers from the area have discovered the secret to catfish farming.

In propagation, Aduma kills two six-month-old male catfish and extracts their pituitary glands, which are found under the skull, and puts them in a glass of water. He adds one tablespoon of table salt to the water and stirs into a solution. Two mililitres of the solution is then drawn in a syringe and injected into a six-month female catfish from behind. The female fish must have eggs that are just beginning to turn grey.

The injection is meant to trigger ovulation in the female catfish, which is kept in a special propagation equipment for two days.

On the third day, the fish is removed, and the ovulated eggs are squeezed out on a special net dipped in water in a propagation trough and the solution of pituitary gland in the glass poured on the eggs for fertilisation.

The fertilised eggs are then left in the trough for two days, where about 10,000 fingerlings are hatched and transferred into a small fertilised pond, where they grow as they wait to be supplied to the market.

“The catfish fingerlings rarely die, especially if the environment is not harsh. They feed on the small plants from the fertilised pond and can be sold after 21 days at Sh5 each,” says Aduma.

From one propagation, Aduma makes about Sh50,000 and he does two propagations in a month. “The biggest advantage with catfish is that they are hardened and are rarely infected by diseases. They also eat many things, including food remains, worms and other algae plants in the pond, so feeding them is cheap,” says Aduma. The biggest challenge is that they cannot reproduce in a pond and a farmer requires specialised training to earn big from the trade.

“The fish are also very violent and eat their fingerlings, hence they cannot be put in one pond with smaller ones,” he says. however, Aduma adds, this can be an advantage as the catfish can be used to control the population in tilapia ponds.

They are also active and can jump out of the ponds and into the natural waters, especially during rains.

Aduma got interested in fish farming in 1996, when Kisumu Catholic Archbishop Zacchaeus Okoth introduced the practice in schools.

He says he was one of the teachers trained to champion the project in his school.