A mechanized harvest system for freshwater fishpond

Development of a prototype-mechanized fish harvesting system for carp from a rectangular shaped fishpond is described in this paper. The system consists of motorized trolleys on the longer dykes of fishpond, rail, boom pipe, netting arrangement and ON/OFF arrangements. The trolleys move on the rail tracks with constant speed of 3 m/min and takes about 15 min to complete the harvesting operation. The overall mean harvest efficiency of Indian major carps (IMC) with mechanized fish harvesting system has been estimated to be around 80% per operation. The whole harvesting operation is done mechanically except collection of harvested fishes at the end of operation, which presently requires two persons getting into the pond and lifting out the fishes from the net.