Channel catfish farming in the US Mississippi Delta uses extensive pond culture with distinct welfare challenges from water quality and harvest practices.
Channel catfish in pond systems face seasonal welfare challenges centred on dissolved oxygen management. Summer algae blooms create photosynthetic oxygen swings, with oxygen depletion events before dawn causing mass mortality and pre-mortality hypoxic stress. Electrical emergency aeration is standard on large farms but does not prevent all welfare-compromising oxygen events. Harvest seining is highly stressful for catfish with wounds from net mesh common. Electrical stunning before processing provides welfare improvement at slaughter.