The catfish fry are born with a yolk sac which provides them with nourishment for about three days. During this time, the fry begin to eat prepared feed and grow darker in color. The fry are ready to be stocked into ponds when they demonstrate necessary survival instincts. Fry are stocked at a rate of 200,000 to 300,000 per acre and placed in ponds from one to five acres in size. By the end of the summer, these fish are large enough to sein and are restocked at the rate of 40,000 to 50,000 per acre.
Most catfish are ready for harvesting at the end of their first year.
However, some wholesale producers do purchase smaller fish on occasion. Normally, catfish are bait seined and loaded by baskets on trucks to be returned to our fish shed. Fish are then graded according to size and placed in separate tanks ready for the consumer. Large orders are occasionally sized directly in the pond and placed into specialized trucks through the use of a backhoe and lift net. Fish are seined, sized and maintained according to orders received.