Effects of stocking density on survival, growth, size variation, and production of Tilapia fry

In aquaculture, controls of size (length and weight) and production of fish are two important tasks to meet the market demands, and increasing the stocking density is a way of dealing with the problem of land shortage. In this study, tilapia fry were stocked at the densities of 0.1, 0.2, 0.4, 0.8, 1.6 and 3.2 fry I^?1 for an experimental period of 10 weeks. The size, size variation, percentage survival and production were found to be significantly affected by stocking density, but not for condition factor. The simple linear regression model, after the logarithmic transformation, was appropriate for the relationship between size and experimental period. The percentage survivals at all stocking densities were high (> 95%), especially at the stocking density of 0.4 fry I^?1 and less (100%). At the higher densities, percentage survival and experimental periods were anti-logistically related. At the end of the experiment, there was a negative relationship between the logarithms of size and the logarithms of stocking density, but a positive relationship between the logarithms of production and the logarithms of stocking density.