Rohu
Rohu feeds in the column, not at the surface.
This is the one thing worth knowing before you buy feed for a rohu pond. Published culture accounts describe the juvenile and adult rohu as an essentially herbivorous column feeder with a niche running from mid-water down towards the bottom. A floating pellet sits above that. It still works, and it is widely used — but it works on your management, not by accident.
Being straight about a floating pellet
Rohu will come up for feed. Intensive rohu culture on extruded floating feed is well established, and the visibility you get in return is worth a great deal: you can read appetite daily, catch a problem the day it starts, and stop paying for feed that is not being eaten. None of that is available to you with a sinking pellet.
What it asks is consistency. Feed at the same points and the same times so the fish learn where to come, start a new pond with small amounts while the habit forms, and judge the ration by what clears rather than by what the bag says. If pellets are still floating after fifteen or twenty minutes, you have fed past the appetite and the rest is going into the water.
Work out your feed cost per kilo- Column to bottomRohu's natural niche is mid-water and below, which is why feeding points and timing matter more here.
- Train the habitSame spots, same hours, small amounts at first. Consistency is what brings the fish up.
- Clear in 15–20 minutesThe ration is set by what the pond actually takes, not by a fixed daily quantity.
- Over half your running costFeed is the largest recurring expense in carp culture, so waste shows up directly in the margin.
Feeding stage guide
Which grade, at which stage.
Rohu use the whole range. What the fish eats changes as much as the particle does: fry take zooplankton, fingerlings select zooplankton and the smaller phytoplankters, and adults shift strongly onto phytoplankton and vegetation.
- Hatchery / fry Aqua Mash Mash
- Nursery Aqua Plus 0.5–0.6 mm · 10 kg
- Early fingerling Aqua Shakti 1 mm · 10 kg
- Fingerling Aqua Shakti 1 mm · 20 kg
- Grower Aqua Pro 2 mm · 35 kg
- Large fish / table size Aqua Grow 3 mm · 35 kg
Rohu reach 700–800 g in the first year and 1–1.5 kg over 12–18 months, so the crop runs past the top of our range. Commercial carp feed spans 1.5–4 mm and 3 mm is readily taken by a large rohu, but published charts move to 4 mm above 250 g, and our 4 mm grade is in development rather than on sale.
Stocking, survival and the year ahead
Rohu is usually stocked at a higher share than the other major carps, because its feeding niche is the widest of the three and it competes least. Grow-out ponds carry 4,000–10,000 fingerlings per hectare across the species mix, with rohu taking 30–40% of it.
Upstream of that, earthen nursery ponds are stocked at 3–10 million spawn per hectare and cement nurseries at 10–20 million, and fingerling rearing runs at a combined 0.2–0.3 million fry per hectare. Published survival is 30–50% through the nursery and 60–70% through fingerling rearing, which is better than katla manages at the same stage.
A one-year rohu measures 35–45 cm. Farms that hold the crop for 12–18 months rather than twelve take it to 1–1.5 kg, which is the size the market pays best for — and the stretch where the largest particle you can get matters most.
- 700–800 g in year onePublished figure, reaching 1–1.5 kg if the crop is carried to 18 months.
- 30–40% of the stocking mixThe widest feeding niche of the three major carps, so it carries the largest share.
- 30–50% nursery survivalHigher than katla at the same stage, and worth planning stocking numbers around.
- Ration falls as fish growAround 5% of body weight a day at 50–100 g, 4% at 100–300 g, 3% at 300–1,000 g.
Common questions
What rohu farmers ask us.
Rohu is a column feeder. Will it take floating feed at all?
Yes. Rohu are fed extruded floating pellets in intensive culture as a matter of routine, and they come to the surface readily once the habit is formed. Feed at fixed points and fixed times, start small on a new pond, and give it a few days. What you get back is the ability to see exactly how much is being eaten.
How much should I feed each day?
Set it as a share of the fish's body weight, not a fixed quantity. The FAO carp table gives 9% a day under 5 g, then 7% at 5–20 g, 6% at 20–50 g, 5% at 50–100 g, 4% at 100–300 g and 3% at 300–1,000 g. Sample-weigh every two weeks and reset it, because feeding rates must come down as the fish grow.
Which grade does a rohu pond spend most of its feed on?
The 2 mm and 3 mm grades, by volume. A fish only passes through the nursery and fingerling sizes once, but it spends most of the year in grow-out, and that is where the tonnage and the cost sit. It is also why conversion efficiency at those two grades decides whether the pond makes money.
Do you guarantee a growth rate?
No, and we would not trust anyone who did. Pond conditions, stocking density, water quality and management all move the result. What we hold to is the specification: every batch is checked against it before release.