What Grass Do Crayfish Like to Eat? Introduction to Common Grasses for Farming

Crayfish is a common aquatic product in daily life, very popular with people every summer, and it is now farmed in many areas, so what grass do crayfish like to eat?

1. What grass do crayfish like to eat?

Crayfish like to eat the tender shoots of aquatic plants such as pondweed, hydrilla, hornwort, water hyacinth, duckweed, and eelgrass. They also like to eat animal feed such as small fish, earthworms, snails and mussels, and livestock and poultry offal, as well as plant-based feed such as soybeans, soybean cake, and corn.

2. How are aquatic plants planted for crayfish?

1. Cutting method: Stemmed aquatic plants such as hydrilla and elodea are suitable for the cutting method, generally planted in winter and spring. The method is to cut the aquatic plants into small sections 15-20 cm long, and like planting rice seedlings, insert bundles of the cut sections evenly into the mud at the bottom of the pond, with plant and row spacing controlled at about 20 cm each. After planting, add water to the crayfish pond to a depth of 20-30 cm, and gradually deepen the water level after the aquatic plants have covered the whole pond.

2. Broadcasting method: Floating-leaf plants such as water chestnut and water lily can be wrapped tightly in soft mud and directly broadcast into the pond, so that their rhizomes grow in the bottom mud and their leaves float on the water surface.

3. Transplanting method: Emergent plants such as wild rice stem and arrowhead should be transplanted with roots; when transplanting, damaged leaves and thin, inferior seedlings should be removed. The transplanting position can be in the shallow shoals at the pond edge, and the seedling roots are required to be 10-20 cm under water, with a density controlled at 30-50 plants per 667 sq m.

4. Cultivation method: For floating plants such as alligator weed, water hyacinth, and duckweed, a corner of the pond can be separated off with bamboo poles, grass ropes, etc. as a cultivation “special zone” for intensive cultivation, allowing the above aquatic plants to grow and reproduce in the “special zone” environment, as a supplement when there is insufficient aquatic plant in the crayfish pond.

5. Sowing method: The most commonly used aquatic plant is generally eelgrass. Eelgrass uses the sowing method and is suitable for crayfish ponds with less mud. First soak the eelgrass seeds in water for 1 day, then rub the softened fruit into pieces, rub out the tiny seeds inside the fruit, add about 10 times the amount of fine sandy soil as the seeds, mix well with the seeds, and then sow. When sowing, control the water level at 10-20 cm, and the sowing rate is about 50 grams per 667 sq m. After sowing, management should be strengthened to improve the survival rate of eelgrass and allow it to form a dominant population as quickly as possible.