Difference between crawfish and prawn

Although crawfish and shrimp belong to the same family, they are different in many ways. Crawfishes are closely related to lobster and prawns are closely related to shrimp.

Appearance: Crawfish has feather liked gills, whereas prawn has branching gills.
Crawfish brood their eggs and babies on pleopad, whereas prawns release their eggs into the water.

Taste: Crawfish are usually less tough and more subtle compared to shrimp. Crawfish generally has a sweet taste and it is full of meat.

Crawfish	Prawn
Freshwater	Saltwater
Decapod with a pair of large, front claws	Decapod with a long tail
Bigger in size	Smaller in size
Spiny shell & long heavy antenna	Laterally compressed, muscular abdomen
Active at night, hides during the day	Active anytime

Why do people love crawfish?

Crawfishes have high value and strong demand.

“Crawfish are close to becoming a national dish in China, where breeding them has become a huge industry (South China Morning Post, 2018)”

“The crawfish market has doubled in size from 5 years ago to 1.1 million tons, while the overall worth of the industry has skyrocketed 80% from a year ago to $38.6 billion (Nikkei Asia, 2018).”

The opportunity to farm crawfishes is to increase supply and meet demand. The demand is exceptionally strong in China and various countries in Asia, where live crawfishes are preferred. It is considered as premium seafood product and the dish offers the best platform for people to socialize. It is not unusual to see diners busy with their phones instead of chatting with each other while eating. If they eat crawfish, using their phones becomes difficult, as they have to use their hands to pull off shells.

Crawfish used to be only a midnight snacks, but has become a formal dish for dinner.

Afterall, the main reason for the popularity of crawfish is its taste, which appears to be universally accepted by all diners.

How to differentiate between Male and Female crawfish

A male crawfish will start to develop its signature bright red pigmentation on their claws during Juvenile stage. Whereas females, there is no colour on their claws.

Another way to tell the gender is by looking at the underside of their bodies.

For female crawfish, there will be 2 holes and for male crawfish, there will be 2 pultruding reproductive organs as seen in the picture below.

Therefore, when adult crawfish reaches maturity level, the male will flip the female over to fertilise her.

Life Cycle of a crawfish

There is a total of 4 stages in a life cycle of a crawfish – Adults, Eggs, Fries and Juvenile.

Adult stage

It takes 4-6 months for crawfishes to reach adulthood and sexual maturity. Adults will actively look to mate. Females will lure males with their urine and males mate by dominating, flipping females over for fertilization. In 4-6 weeks, the developing eggs will be transferred to the outside of the female’s body and glued via an adhesive called “glair” to the female tail. In captivity, a mature adult can reach a length of 12inches and weigh up to 250g.

Eggs

Female crawfish carries the eggs inside her body for 4-6 weeks and is capable of holding 400-1000 eggs each time. The incubation periods between 22 and 42 weeks in 5 stages.

Stage 1: Light cream/Yellow in color (day 1-3)

Stage 2: Dark brown/Grey in color (day 12-14)

Stage 3: Eye spots and little tails are formed (day 20-23)

Stage 4: Eggs will hatch and turn Orange-Red in color (day 28-35)

Stage 5: Fries are released from their mother (day 35-40)

Fries

After hatching from the eggs, the fries feed on their yolk, growing eyes and tails resembling a crawfish. The fries will stay with their mother for 7-14 days before abandoning her in search for food. During this period, the fries are extremely vulnerable and, being cannibalistic in nature, they will attempt to feed on each other if there is a lack of food.

Juvenile

As crawfish matures, their body elongate and start to look for food like fishes and plants. In order for them to grow, they undergo the moulting process where they will grow by 20-30% each time. After 50 days, the male crawfish will also start to develop its signature bright red pigmentation on their claws.

Crawfish Nutrition Facts

Macronutrients – Crawfishes are rich in Vitamin A, D and omega-3 fatty acids. For each serving (100g), it contains only 81 calories and 115 milligram of cholesterol which is way under the 300 milligrams limit recommended by health professionals.

Vitamins – A serving of crawfish fulfils is 30% of your body’s daily requirement for vitamins. These vitamins are essential for our nervous system function, turning the food you eat into energy and keeping your liver, skin, eyes and hair healthy.

Minerals – Do you know that crawfishes are a good source of phosphorus? Phosphorus helps our body create and store energy, strengthen bones, teeth and assist with muscle and nerve function. The high level of zinc found in crawfishes help with wound healing and building up our immunity system.

Keeping crawfish as pet

Crawfishes can be kept as excellent pets, as they are very hardy, all you need to do to ensure their survival is to provide them basic elements – Air, Water, Food.
You can simply keep them in freshwater aquarium. It is extremely interesting to watch them grow and evolve overtime.

An air pump and filter would be vital as you need to provide ample amount of oxygen and clean the water to ensure they live in a comfortable environment. Remember, crawfish can live on land for up to 24hours as long their exoskeleton is wet. Don’t be afraid if you need to leave it outside while you clean the tank.

Crawfish eat almost anything and everything. You can feed them with normal pellets, fruits, vegetables and even leftover food like ikan bilis and chicken meat as long as they are not oily. Take note, if you want to feed raw meat, make sure to scoop it away if the crawfish cannot finish as it will cause the water to turn foul.
Crawfishes love hiding in the dark, if you have multiple crawfishes, do remember to add some rocks or pipes into the tank for them to hide and sleep.

Different types of crawfish cuisine around the world

The common myth is that only a small part of the body of a crawfish is eaten – crawfish tail. Contrary to this belief, various parts of this little crustacean can be eaten, including its pincers as well as sucking the head. There are many different types of cooking style and recipes all over the world.

In France, they prefer to cook it with garnish base which is called “à la Nantuaise”.
In China, people love spicy stir-fry which is called “Mala”, often paired it with beer.
In Russia and Ukraine, they usually boil it and considered as an appetizer which they enjoyed it with beer and liquor.

In Sweden and Finland, they pair it with vodka or akvavit chaser.

People love eating crawfish so much that they actually have crawfish festivals for all crawfish lovers to gather and enjoy. There will be music, dance, contest and even a parade in addition to delicious food usually celebrating for 2-3 days.

About Cherax Quadricarinatus

Cherax Quadricarinatus is a species of crawfish, resembling that of a small lobster. It is often called crayfish, crawdads, mudbugs, yabbies and freshwater lobsters.
These crawfishes live in freshwater habitats and originates from swamp lands. However, due to its popular demand as a source of food, we have seen many modern crawfish rearing farms propping up all around the world.

Crawfish Facts

Crawfish takes approximately 6 months to grow from an egg to a mature adult reaching a size of 20cm (8 inch), and weigh an estimated 100 -150g. These hardy creatures have an average lifespan of up to 5 years living in optimal conditions.
Their bodies are categorized into 2 sections – the midsection and the segmented body. Crawfishes come in various colors and they are usually sandy yellow, green, red or dark brown in color.

Crawfish head is shaped with a sharp snout and the compound eyes are on movable stalks. Their exoskeleton (body covering) is thin but tough. They have 5 pairs of legs. The front pair is its powerful pincer which are essential tools for defense, food gathering and object manipulation. Subsequent 5 pairs of legs under the abdomen is used for swimming and circulating water for respiration, breathing through their feather-like gills.

Crawfishes are nocturnal creatures. Rarely seen during the day but coming to life at night, scurrying and scavenging for food. You can see them actively crawling all around but when danger arises, they flap their strong tail and disappear in a blink of an eye.

A peek into a Singapore firm’s revolutionary modular crawfish hatcher

A Singapore firm is planning to build the world’s first specific pathogen-free (SPF) hatchery producing 300,000 crayfish fries per day to satisfy growing regional demand for the popular crustacean.

Despite the global growth in the popularity of crawfish farming in recent years, two major challenges are faced. Most traditional farmers face the problems of limited knowledge of crawfish breeding and the hefty labor cost of manually separating fry from adults to prevent filial cannibalism. Since 2018, Singapore Crawfish Pte Ltd. vowed to search for a solution to help traditional crawfish farmers solve their problems. After years of research and rigorous testing and multiple project failures, finally, in 2020 they managed to produce a modular Auto Birthing System (ABS™), one that is not only cost-efficient, space conducive but also can be easily maintained and is highly modular. The patented system can provide a quantifiable and sustainable way to produce a constant number of crawfish fry daily. Fry mortality decreases significantly and this technology could change the face of global aquaculture since it aims to solve five main problems:

1. The high cost of traditional crawfish hatcheries.
2. The immense labor required to extract or separate crawfish fry.
3. The high mortality of crawfish fry face when mishandled.
4. The unstable production and supply of crawfish fry in traditional farms.
5. The difficulties in scaling up or down for traditional crawfish hatcheries.

Improving the breeding process

The main objective is to improve the survival and stable reproduction rates of crawfish that increase the profitability and sustainability for farmers, even those with limited knowledge, infrastructure and resources. The traditional method of stripping eggs from the adults and putting the eggs on trays stresses both adults and eggs. The new system is way more reliable and efficient compared to the traditional methods of extracting crawfish fry where mortality can spike up to 80%, especially when mishandled and exposed to bacteria. To date, most crawfish farmers have to manually harvest the eggs and the process is labor-intensive. A crayfish female spawns up to three times a year, producing up to 1,200 eggs each time – thus removing eggs from thousands of crawfishes can be a momentous task. The ABS™ system looks like a few simple rows of tanks joint together but the magic happens within where genetically selected male and female crawfishes are carefully stocked within at the exact ratio in an environment made suited for reproduction and breeding.

Specific feed formula

Broodstock are fed a highly nutritious, specialized feed which increases their fecundity rates, a special formula made in-house by Singapore Crawfish. Their specialized feed is unique in a few ways since it increases the growth rate of crawfish by up to 100%, stimulates mating and reproduction, increases the number of eggs produced by up to 200% and does not pollute the water environment.

Modular system

The new system is modular and can be stacked or upgraded at any time to maximize value through economies of scale. It requires minimal technical expertise, enabling any users to upgrade their existing system without having to disrupt their operations. It is paired with a fully self-contained land-based recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) that removes the sludge and keeps the water clean. It is most suited for commercial farmers who want to have a stable and quantifiable source of fry to provide and distribute to the local market or farmers.

Market perspectives

The company is looking for franchises in different countries. With an entry cost of $1,000,000, farmers will be able to produce a minimum of 20,000 fry per day and 7.3 million fry per year. Investors can look at breaking even within 18 months and start having revenues of $1,000,000 starting the second year. The company will have a limited number of hatcheries in each market to prevent price wars and competition. Currently, Singapore Crawfish only offers their ABS™ hatchery through pre-orders and ships the product to any international buyer within 30 days. The company has an especially large potential impact in emerging markets like Malaysia where their crawfish industry is booming and eventually plans to have their hatchery franchises all over the world. The company is also working with two major genetic companies to develop stronger- and faster-growing strains. They are testing the concept of having genetically-mapped crawfish that is tolerant to various environmental conditions such as temperature and pH fluctuations and expect to have its genetically-enhanced crawfish by 2022.

Crawfish Aquaculture System

We help set up state of the art indoor and outdoor aquaculture systems with our 9 key techniques and technologies which we are able to achieve amazing results for our crawfishes. All our products and machineries are customized and tailored to fit your farm and operations and they come with a 2 year service warranty. Do feel free to drop us a message for a free 30 minutes consultation.

Consultation & Education

As a holistic crawfish company, we incorporate consultancy and educate all our franchisees and customers about crawfish best practices. Our consultation focuses on both indoor and outdoor intensive crawfish-farming. With key techniques and technologies developed by our team of aquacultural scientists, researchers, technical experts and partnered farmers, we are confident to produce the best turnkey solution to any crawfish farms.
We have an in-depth understanding of the global aquaculture and crawfish value chain. For both new and existing crawfish farming operations, we will provide a critical eye and bring solutions that improve your operations and business.

Market & Environmental Feasibility studies

The decision to start a crawfish business must be supported by an extensive investigation that helps you decide if such business will succeed in your location. As much as we would love to paint you a wonderful picture, the aquaculture sector abounds with success stories, but also with multiple failed projects.

We will always conduct detailed feasibility studies to help close the uncertainty gap, helping decision makers like you decide which is the best course of action. Be it the choice to grow crawfishes indoors or outdoors, or even to take up a certain business model to lower your risk and increase your profits. We will also conduct surveys and study your local market trends on crawfish supply and demand, to help you chart your course.

Due diligence and risk management

We strongly believe that an external party’s evaluation of projects and farms can be useful in many ways. Such as to conduct assessments to identify operational and biological risk, improve existing operations, highlighting to prospective investors to assess the potential of a business, covering all risk management aspects and even having the due diligence to improve business plans and engineering assumptions. We will thoroughly investigate infrastructure, equipment and protocols and their implementation concerning system performance, health and safety, biosecurity, welfare, risk management, sustainability and certification.

Training & knowledge sharing

We believe sharing knowledge leads to the best results. All our consultants at Singapore Crawfish will provide you with training and support on farm design, biosecurity, water quality management, crawfish health, farm maintenance and general f arm operation. We are always more than happy to share our knowledge and spread our love for this tiny crustacean. We love to involve all stakeholders while developing a project, to ensure a thorough understanding of the farm by those who look after your crawfish every day.

Multi-Cropping

In agriculture, multi-cropping is the practice of growing two or more crops in the area to maximize efficiency and to yield more profits. Singapore Crawfish looks to yield crawfish, vegetables and fish all in one ecosystem where plants depend on the feces of the fishes and crawfishes for nutrients while the plants rid water of excess ammonia and nitrites. A truly self-contained ecosystem, do contact us to find out which fishes and plants are the best match!

Frozen & Processed Crawfish

Think beyond fresh

Many shoppers assume live is always best. At SGCF, we tout the benefits of canned, packed, and frozen crawfishes which can be as good or some might say even better than live.

Frozen crawfishes are less expensive than live. They are available year-round, convenient for quick-easy meals and most important of all, you don’t have to kill them yourselves.

Research shows frozen crawfish may have a smaller carbon footprint than live because they can be transported by freighter or train, which use less fossil fuel than planes. It also retains its fresh flavour because it’s frozen right at the source.

Specially Formulated Crawfish Feed

At Singapore crawfish, our researchers have developed a high-quality crawfish feed by combining 18 special ingredients, delivered without artificial preservatives and rich in essential amino acids. Our specialized feed is produced sustainably and it contains a crude protein that is superior to commonly used feed ingredients; it is highly digestible, rich in protein, vitamins and minerals. Our crawfish feed has been developed by non-other than the world’s most recognised aqua feed nutritionist Dr Albert Tacon, specifically for crawfish use.

Our crawfish feed has demonstrated superiority over traditional fish meal-based shrimp feeds in survivability, growth and disease remediation. It provides excellent survivability, immune system support and superior growth. This has been demonstrated in both controlled lab tests and third-party pond trials.
Our feed wholly meets the nutritional requirements of the crawfish throughout their lifecycle.

We are in the process of developing our broodstock feed as brood stock nutrition has a profound influence on the fecundity levels affecting the quantity, quality and performance of the offspring. At our research facility, we are carefully balancing the essential nutrients is vital for ensuring breeder conditioning, optimal sperm and egg development while providing sufficient energy to aid in the birthing of crawfish fries.

Crawfish Growth Hacking Technology

With the use of our formulated feed and our in-house hi-tech aquaculture systems, our crawfishes are able to achieve a higher growth rate by a minimum of 20% to 50% as compared to traditional crawfish farms. Our patented Auto-birthing systems also drops the mortality of our crawfish frys by a significant 70% through automation and segregation. Learn our special farming methods of enhancing growth, reducing mortality and ensuring healthier crawfishes.

Crawfish Fries (Craylings)

Singapore Crawfish is the world’s most advanced commercial crawfish hatchery, specifically established to solve industry-wide hatching losses. We are confident to say that there are no commercial crawfish hatcheries in the world that has the effectiveness and the capabilities to produce parallel volume of quality crawfish fries.
Founder and inventor Mr Desmond Chow of the patented “Crawfish Auto Birthing System”, infuses his propriety system which reduces labour and energy cost by 90%. He deploys the latest disease monitoring and water management techniques, resulting in significant decrease in mortality rates thus producing healthier specific pathogen-free crawfish for the benefit of all stakeholders down the supply chain. To date, our exports of SPF brood stock has been sent to into Malaysia, Taiwan, China, Thailand, Indonesia, Philippines and Cambodia.

Singapore Crawfish has made significant improvements in shipping and packaging techniques to achieved higher survival rates even for long distance flights up to 24 hours. The higher survival combined with excellent reproduction and grow-out performance has resulted in higher return on investment (ROI) for hatcheries and crawfish farms.

Singapore Crawfish is the world’s standard the production of Cherax Quadricarinatus fries, covering all aspects involved in the birthing process, including sourcing of genetically superior brood stock, selection and removal of laggards through genetic mapping, growth and environmental diagnostics, disease management, feeding, storage and shipping to customers nationwide and globally.

All fries from Singapore Crawfish are healthy, disease-free, holds superior genetics and overall, more resilient than any known crawfish fries out in the market. We aim to supply worldwide to grow-out farmers to fulfil our mission to feed the world.

Order: We sell in batches of 50,000 crawfish fries and only receive pre-orders at least 1 week in advance. Singapore Crawfish currently sells their fries in two sizes – 1cm and 1 inch.

Live Adult Crawfish For Consumption

Singapore Crawfish is a sustainable farm-based crawfish supplier established in 2018. We specialise in the growing and breeding of crawfishes sustainably following ethical sourcing, packing, processing and supplying a variety of live, fresh and frozen crawfishes to hotels, restaurants and homes.

The crawfishes we culture are reared in the cleanest environment, protected from harmful bacteria and diseases by 4 stages of filters and a nano-level disinfectant system which is also environmentally friendly. We bring you fresh-tasting live crawfishes free* from pollutants, antibiotics and growth hormones. No artificial bio-chemicals are added to our crawfish which means giving our customers the best nature has to offer.

We have attained the quality standards certified under ISO22000 Quality & Food Safety Management, and are MSC and ASC certified for our practices towards crawfish sustainability, environmental and social responsibility.
We provide crawfishes wholesale as we deliver our live products in our commercial temperature-controlled trucks and have storage and filtration facilities for daily deliveries. Everyday (24/7), including weekends and public holidays, to support your businesses.

In the years since we adopted a formal sustainability policy for our seafood, we have proven that doing the right thing for the environment and consumer health is a profitable business model. This only will become more evident as consumer concern about the environmental and health impacts of crawfishes continues to grow.

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