Mullet is an ideal candidate fish suitable for farming in brackish water ponds. Shri.Ambrose Thommissery was a traditional fisherman till October 2012. He earns hardly INR 20,000/- per annum from this 0.80 acre brackish water pond coupled with fishing in local water bodies. He was striving to manage his family of four. KVK intervened and trained him in scientific Mullet (Mugil cephalus) fish farming in his pond. In order to demonstrate scientific farming of mullet in brackish water ponds, mullet fry’s caught from wild using improved gears. Quality control of seeds was ensured by using healthy and damage free seeds transported in oxygen filled polythene bags. Nursery rearing of Mullet fry’s was done in happa nets erected in the pond. Nursery rearing of Mullet fry’s was done in happa nets for fifty days. Intensive care and spot feeding was done during this period. Ninety per cent of the stocked fry’s survived and reached fingerling size of average 7 cm length and 6 gm weight after the nursery rearing phase. The fingerlings were then released into the pond for grow-out culture. Further the fishes were weaned to using 2mm and 3mm floating pellet feed and the culture continued for 10 months. 

Output of the intervention: The fishes reached average length of 35 cm and weight of 520 gm with 80 % survival rate whereas the conventional farmers get a survival percent of 10-30% only. Live caught fish were marketed at farm gate itself. It was a great success due to high domestic demand for the live farm fresh fish. This process also avoided the intervention of middle men and fetched maximum price higher than the prevailing retail market price. The total expenditure including seed cost, feed, pond cleaning and other miscellaneous expenditure was INR 44,500/- . A total of 500 kg fish was harvested and sold at the rate of INR 500/- per Kg fetching a total income of INR 2.5 lakhs BC ratio was 1:5.

Outcome of the intervention: Following the success of the demonstration, 15 nearby traditional farmers in the locale replicated  scientific mullet farming programme.