[a photo from a previous stream cleaning]

2.  There’s FISH in our stream!

The other night our other house mate Spencer and I were walking around the park and I shined my flashlight onto a part of a fence that had a hole in it that overlooked the stream and all of the sudden we heard all of this commotion.  I honestly was freaked out and was afraid to look over.  Spencer went to look and there were fish that didn’t like the light and were swimming upstream.  After watching more closely I thought they were mudpuppies, because they didn’t really look like they were totally swimming.  We then walked around some more and saw a bunch of toads.  In my mind I thought a mudpuppy turned into a toad, like a tadpole turns into a frog.  I’m wrong.

Fast forward to this past weekend.  YWAM Honolulu volunteered at the Manoa Stream Cleaning.  So I was sent with a small group of people up stream from where we live to pick up trash.  As we were wading in knee deep water we found the fish that I thought was a mudpuppy.  I had to go home and look it up.  I found out that its plecostomus which is an algae eater.

A student and I tried to catch them with our hands.  When I touched one it was not at all what I was expecting, it was really hard.  After I found out that the fish was plecostomus I instantly googled if they were edible.  People have said it’s better than tilapia and almost taste like lobster.  I guess it’s related to the catfish.

I only have had catfish once, in North Carolina, when I was young, with my Great Uncle Danny and Great Aunt Paula.  I don’t remember being a fan.  But I’d try it again.  The only downside is our stream has lepto because of the pigs in the mountains.

I recently got my air pump fixed and have put airstones in the 5 gallon buckets for the baby tilapia so I could do the same with the pleco.  I might put them in a rubbermaid container.  I figure if I feed it and change its water often that if there are any toxin in it they will come out after a month or two.

So tomorrow we are taking a friend to the airport early, and then we’re going to hike up diamond head and then go upstream to catch some fish.  I’ll take my fishing net and a 5 gallon bucket and walk upstream to catch some invasive pleco.  Don’t worry I’ll keep doing more research about quarantining him before I eat it, but I feel like people have probably been eating fish right out of streams with lepto or similar diseases for ages right?

I think raising fish is my favorite part of aquaponics.  I was at whole foods the other day and they had tilapia filets on ice, about the size of some of my bigger fish for $10.99 a lb.  I felt like a rich man.

I visited a friends aquaponics farm that he’s working on and loved that they had two 2000 gallon tanks.  Some of the tilapia were HUGE.  And to see giant grow beds was pretty amazing too.  Fish of all different sizes, and different experimental aquaponics systems being set up.  It was really cool.  I enjoy gardening and doing aquaponics, but I don’t think I could recreate my system.  But now that it’s set up and running, I do enjoy it.

I got some azolla and mint today from my friends farm.  And I’ll be sowing some cabbage and green onion seeds tomorrow.  I actually just came in from outback with a flashlight and found 3 snails and 2 slugs munching on my plants.  That was the last thing they did… jerks.

Here’s to catching fish with a net, because I’ve never caught one with a pole.

Do you enjoy fishing?  What’s the best thing you’ve ever caught?  Tell us in the comments.