Nothing in Our Ponds but Fish
Ask most people how catfish are farmed in Nigeria and they will picture concrete tanks, plastic vats and borehole water. That is how a lot of catfish are raised today. It is fast, it is controllable, and it works.
We chose a different way.
Mud, water and time
Our catfish grow in earthen ponds, dug into the land in Oshiri, Ebonyi State. The pond beds are natural mud. The water comes from the Ebonyi River, a few metres from the farm.
We add nothing else to the ponds.
No lime. No chemicals. No antibiotics. No treatments.
Just fish, natural water and natural pond beds.
Why it matters for taste
Catfish take on the character of the water they live in. Fish raised in a natural pond, on moving river water, over a natural bed, develop differently from fish kept in a tank.
The flesh is firmer. The taste is cleaner. Buyers who cook our fish often tell us it reminds them of river fish.
We won’t claim it is identical to wild-caught. It is farmed fish, fed on quality commercial feed so it grows healthily and consistently. But it is raised in conditions far closer to the wild than any tank. You can taste that difference.
Why we don’t use chemicals
It would be easier in some ways to treat the water, lime the ponds or reach for antibiotics at the first sign of trouble. Many farms do.
We would rather do the harder work: keep the water right, stock the ponds sensibly and watch the fish every day. Healthy water makes healthy fish. We wrote about why in Water Quality: The Most Important Factor in Fish Farming.
When the water is right, the fish don’t need rescuing.
How we got here
Udemba Farms started with a single pond. Today we run eight earthen ponds, raising both Clarias, the native African catfish, and hybrid catfish. Every pond is run the same way it was on day one: natural water, natural beds, nothing added.
Every fish is harvested to order. Nothing sits frozen in storage. What reaches you left the pond the day you ordered it.
The Udemba Way
Farming like this takes more patience. It asks more of our team, and it leaves less room for shortcuts.
That is the point.
We would rather grow good fish slowly than ordinary fish quickly.
Made in Oshiri, the Udemba Way.
Want to taste the difference? We supply restaurants, hotels, bulk buyers and market traders across Ebonyi State and beyond.