Complete Guide to Hatching Giant Prawns, Proven Success!

Untuk mendapatkan hasil budidaya udang yang maksimal, Bapak/Ibu perlu memperhatikan teknik pembenihan udang galah supaya mendapatkan benih udang yang unggul dan berkualitas terbaik. The technique in question starts from selecting giant prawn broodstock, rearing, spawning, hatching, to caring for the larvae.

Udang galah merupakan salah satu komoditas udang air payau dengan permintaan yang stabil dan cenderung tinggi setiap harinya. Permintaan udang galah tak hanya berasal dari pedagang di pasar tradisional saja, melainkan juga berasal dari restoran sampai konsumsi rumah tangga. Maka, tak heran bila udang galah memiliki nilai ekonomis yang cukup menjanjikan.

However, before starting giant prawn cultivation, Farmers Friends need to know the methods and techniques for giant prawn hatcheries in order to produce the best quality prawns at fantastic selling prices.

Tips for Success in Hatching Prawns

1. Selection of broodstock

Prawns belong to this category palaemonidae family with the body parts it consists of cephalothorax (starting from the top of the head and chest), abdomen or body parts, and uropods or tail parts.

Shrimp have the physical characteristic of a hard shell on the inside cephalothorax to protect those parts and the serrated carapace protrusions in the area of the head. The protrusions at the top are 11-13 pieces, while at the bottom there are 8-14 pieces.

In addition, the difference between male and female shrimp lies in the size of their walking legs. Ideally, the size of the male shrimp's walking legs is longer than the female shrimp's walking legs. The size of the male shrimp's walking legs is 1.5 times longer than the male shrimp's body itself.

The criteria for selecting brood prawns that you need to pay attention to are:

• The female brood weight is more than 40 grams.
• The weight of the male sires is more than 50 grams.
• The age of the brood ranges from 8-20 months.
• Have a normal and complete physical condition, alias not disabled.
• The broodstock of shrimp are suitable for mating which is characterized by the maturation of eggs at least 2 times with a large number of eggs produced.
• The physical condition of the sires is free from all kinds of parasites, diseases and dirt.

2. Parent Maintenance

When entering the maintenance stage, male and female giant prawn broodstock are kept in separate ponds. This maintenance pond is made of concrete with a pool depth rule of between 80-100 cm. 

In one pond can only be filled as many as 3-4 broodstock per m2. The rules for feeding during the maintenance stage are in the form of feed given as much as 5% of the weight of the giant prawns. You need to ensure that the prawn feed contains 30% protein.

3. Spawning

The sign that giant prawns are ready to spawn is the appearance of an orange or yellowish color around the gonads and spreads out cephalothorax. Then, there is a change of skin in the female brood and a decrease in her physical condition. However, soon the female sires returned to normal and were ready to spawn.

You can keep male and female brooders in any type of pond with a ratio of the number of male and female sires, namely 1 to 3. Usually the spawning process occurs at night and lasts for 21 days.

4. Hatching

After the 21-day spawning process is complete, you need to separate the female and male prawn brooders to proceed to the next stage, namely hatching. Female broodstock with gray eggs are soaked in a pond which has been dissolved in Methylene Blue as much as 1.5 mg per liter for 15 to 25 minutes. In addition, fill the pond water with brackish water that has a salinity of around 3-5 ppt.

The size of the hatchery pond is 1 x 1 x 0.5 m2 for 25 giant prawn brooders. To control the quality of the water, you can add small pieces of potatoes, sweet potatoes or cassava. At temperatures of 28 to 30 degrees Celsius, giant prawn eggs will hatch after 6 to 12 hours.

5. Larvae Care

After the freshwater giant prawn seeds hatch, you can separate them in a special round tub or one made of fiberglass. Clean the tub using a disiphon then control the salinity of the pool water at 10 to 12 ppt and routinely change the pool water every day as much as 25 percent to 50 percent of the total volume of water in the tub.

Meanwhile, the rules for feeding the larvae are not particularly difficult. You only need to ensure that the size of the feed matches the size of the larva's mouth. Ideally, on the third day after hatching, the shrimp larvae are fed artemia once every 3 hours.

When the larvae have grown to become juveniles or juveniles, the water salinity can be reduced gradually to 0 ppt. At this stage, the shrimp are ready to be transferred to the rearing pond.

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