5000 fingerling tilapia delivered

Picking up the fingerlings at 11am at Dominion Farms in Yala Swamp near Bondo- we left Kakamega at 6:40 am. The guy on the left is standing in a floating wheelbarrow.

The crew bags the fish in double plastic bags, 500 per bag, with oxygen added.

While I was overseeing the fingerling packaging, Matano was getting 500 Kg of feed loaded into the matatu behind me.  It was a gong show of paperwork, gates and askaris.  We are only 3 hours from Kakamega but the workers all speak a different dialect.  Fortunately I was mentally prepared for the 2.5 hr run around.

When we arrived at the first widow's pond at 5pm later that same day the rain started to pour- everyone ran inside leaving me and this boy to do the actual release of fingerlings into Grace's pond.  That is the overflow stand-pipe sticking out of the water.

To minimize the time the fishies spent in plastic bags we had Mr Shitambasi meet us at SomKen petrol station.  He was an hour late and showed up on a bicycle.  We paid someone to look after his bike and hired him this motorcycle so he could rush his 1500 fish to the waiting pond.

The worst part was watching the fish slosh back and forth for 3+ hours as we drove the terrible roads back to Kakamega.  Fortunately we only saw a half dozen morts upon delivery

After waiting for the worst of the rain to subside Matano and I released the last 1000 fingerlings into Esther Anyoso's pond.  This was the only release that had a couple morts.

Moses, Matano and me met at Tour Africa Cafe at 6am and got back to Kakamega at 6pm after fish delivered to ponds. A very successful day. And I have to admit a dream come true.  39 years after going to a pet store and bringing home my first African fish to my first aquarium that I got from my Auntie Katie, here I was in Kenya holding a plastic bag of fish and returning 'home' with it.  This time as part of a Rotary District Community Grant.  Ever since I opened my first tropical fish book as a kid I have dreamed of this moment- growing fish in an African pond. I dreamed of doing it for a living, and who knows...  In 2009 time would not allow me to be present for the fingerling transport and delivery. Today the fish get to rest, tomorrow I will tour the 4 recipient ponds and do some feed training- we gave them nice laminated feed tables (written by me, published by Tanya) to follow.




I will post a couple movies later Allah/ God willing- takes about 5 hours to upload.  We haven't had 5 hours between power outages all week.  What a day, 8 hours of bumping and grinding in that matatu could not dampen my spirits.