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What is Aquaculture?
Aquaculture or fish farming pertains to the process of breeding, rearing, and harvesting aquatic organism. There are two major groups of aquaculture. There is marine aquaculture and freshwater aquaculture. Marine aquaculture involves raising organism that are native to the ocean. A variety of marine organism like, oysters, clams, mussels, shrimp, and a variety of fish, can be raised in marine systems. In freshwater aquaculture organism native to rivers, lakes, and streams are raised. There are two main types of aquaculture used today. The first type of aquaculture is extensive aquaculture. Extensive aquaculture used natural or man-made bodies of water to raise the livestock. When raising livestock in rivers and the ocean, fish are put into large mesh nets where they will be raised and harvested. Extensive aquaculture is more stressful on the fish and cause more deaths than intensive aquaculture. Hardy organisms are the only ones that can be raised with extensive aquaculture. Intensive aquaculture uses artificial tanks to raise livestock. The temperature, salinity, pH, and other water quality are all controlled in the tanks by Aquaculturists. Intensive aquaculture yields more livestock than extensive due to all the factors being controlled. Current research is being done to determine which species are most suitable for these two types of aquaculture.

History of Aquaculture
Aquaculture has been dated back to 500 B.C. with the ancient Chinese. A man named Fan Li wrote a book titled “The Classic of Fish Culture”. His book described about the structure of ponds and how to propagate common carp. Between 500 B.C. and 500 A.D. was the Golden Age of Aquaculture. Carp propagation became more widespread into neighboring countries. The actual development of aquaculture did not begin to 618 A.D. in the Tang Dynasty. The Tang Emperor prohibited the culture of the common carp, which caused people to discover new species they could harvest. The people found that the silver carp, the big-head carp, the grass carp, and the mud carp could all successfully be raised and harvested in aquaculture ponds. From the 1300’s to the 1600’s during the Ming dynasty, aquaculture became more developed and the processes were written down. There were methods for raising the fish, how to build the ponds, how to rotate the population, disease control, and other processes used to have a successful aquaculture farm. The first attempts of aquaculture in North America was to raise sport fish. From the 1970’s to now the main focus of aquaculture is to raise high value species to export to other countries.

What are the Advantages of Aquaculture?
A majority of the world’s population consumes seafood. This puts strain on the natural populations of fish and other aquatic organisms. Aquaculture provides over fifty percent of the world’s seafood market. Without aquaculture the natural supply would not be able to support the worlds need for seafood. The US has taken more of an effort to improve aquaculture and make it better for the environment and healthier to eat.

Aquaculture is a sustainable resource, unlike other fisheries we have today. The fish are born, raised, and breed in tanks or nets. It does not take from the natural population once the fishery is started up. The Monterey Bay Aquarium listed many fish species that are farmed as the “Best Choice” on the Seafood Watch Northeast Sustainable Seafood Guide. When comparing how much food it takes to raise a fish to how much food the fish provides it is considered an efficient resource. It takes 1.2 pounds of food to raise 1 pound of salmon. This is better than the chicken ratio which is 1.9 pounds of food to 1 pound of chicken.

When fishing for fish in the wild it can be unpredictable and there are limits on how much can be caught and when. With aquaculture fish can be available year round and with no limit on how much is raised. Aquaculture also provides many jobs and since it is a sustainable resource the jobs are secure and stable. Aquaculture in the United States generates one billion dollars every year and the world’s aquaculture generates one hundred billion every year.

What are the disadvantages of Aquaculture?
There are many disadvantages to aquaculture that have not been solved yet. When raising large quantities of fish in tanks the fish are susceptible to disease. To control disease in the tanks the water is treated with antibiotics and other chemicals used to control disease. When the fish ingest these chemicals they accumulate in there tissues which humans later will eat. This raises health concerns for eating farmed fish. Fish that are farmed also do not eat what they would typically eat when in the wild. Fish can be feed fish meal and fish oil. Salmon normally eat krill in the wild which gives them their signature color but when feed fish meal the color is duller, so they dye the fish the correct color.

There are a number of other chemicals added to the water to control foul and to make the fish more relaxed as well as the chemicals used to fight disease. These chemicals can be leaked into the surrounding environment causing stress on the local ecosystems. Some fish that are farmed are not native to certain areas and might escape. This also causes stress on the local ecosystem and the invasive species can take over the ecosystem and kill the natural species.

Aquaculture in the Future
As the world population keeps growing there will be a higher demand for seafood. The current wild population of fish will most likely not be able to sustain the world. Aquaculture has the potential to provide a healthy stable flow of seafood for the world. There is current research being done on many aspects of aquaculture to make it healthier to eat and better for the environment. There is research being done to reduce the amount of waste water produced from aquaculture. This will allow aquaculture to be better for the environment and reduce that amount of stress on the surrounding ecosystem. Studies on how the abiotic factors affect the biotic factors in the aquaculture systems. This will improve the amount of chemicals will be needed to put into the water to control disease and algae growth. Biofloc is a new technology being used to control the amount of Nitrogen and Carbon in the aquaculture system. Biofloc creates a sustainable way to control the water quality in an aquaculture system. Biofloc still needs to be furthered researched to know the best way to use this new technology. The biofloc will benefit aquaculture in the future making it more acceptable to the world.