Cobia aquaculture under Queensland conditions - a project within the Queensland Aquaculture Development Initiative 2007-2009

Abstract

This report was compiled in 2010 after the first two seasons of cobia aquaculture research in Queensland. It has since been used to provide baseline methodologies, and helped guide production methods for cobia at the Bribie Island Research Centre (BIRC) from 2007 to 2014. In 2015, some disease issues experienced in the various cobia production systems stimulated the investigation of different larval rearing and nursery culture methodologies. The implementation of a white spot disease control zone in 2016 in southern Queensland (encompassing BIRC) further supported an alternative indoor culture approach for cobia fingerling production at BIRC.
As commercial operations in Queensland and Australia move towards independent cobia fingerling production, the Queensland Government is eager to make all research outcomes available for industry consideration. This early research and information may also be useful as industry moves towards further finfish diversifications in the future, because it identifies and documents methods that are applicable to many finfish species, having provided successful, scalable, biosecure and cost-effective seed stock production methodologies for several years as the virtues of this species were investigated in commercial settings.