Common Mistakes in Aquaculture Trials & How to Avoid Them

Amazing progress is made every year in aquaculture. Progress towards sustainability, animal welfare, efficiency and economic prosperity for coastal communities. Since Onda has opened its doors, it has been equal parts witness and participant in these developments. As the aquaculture industry continues to grow, sustainability and improving farming practices are more important than ever. CROs are a major part of this process, as conducting well-planned, ethical, and regulated aquaculture trials are essential for generating the data needed to validate products, improve health outcomes, and support regulatory or commercial decisions. Solutions to aquaculture’s most pressing challenges such as disease, pests, sustainability and profitability often start on bench tops around the world but for global commercial supply are moved to tank-based research. These trials can be the start of a product launch that could have lasting impact, but even well-intentioned trials can fall short if key details are overlooked.

Onda welcomes a variety of innovators through our doors, from large pharmaceutical companies with global offices to small start-ups ready to create ripples. We have worked on pilot trials testing new ideas to GLP trials preparing for regulatory submission, and through this process have learned  how to best avoid risk and set our clients up for success. Based on what we see most often across commercial and pre-commercial studies, here are some common pitfalls in aquaculture trials and ways to avoid them.

Lots of questions without a clear objective.

The mistake:
R&D dollars are quite often tight and shared amongst a variety of departments and product testing. Sometimes this leads to “catchall” trial design, asking a variety of questions to maximize R&D budgets. This leads to trials that are designed too broadly, trying to answer multiple questions at once without a clear primary endpoint. When a trial is designed to answer too many questions, the result is often data without direction. Instead of generating clear evidence, the study produces a large volume of results that are difficult to interpret, prioritize or defend. 

How to avoid it:
Being focused on a small number of clearly defined outcomes will deliver the best data for your decision making moving forward. Define one primary objective and a limited number of secondary objectives. This will avoid risks such as statistical dilution, conflicting signals, and decrease complexity and inconsistency which could impact trial outcome. Clear goals help guide study design, sampling schedules, and data analysis. As your CRO partner, we are invested in getting answers to your questions, can walk through this process with you, guide you so that you get the most out of every study and every dollar you spend. 

Not Accounting for Biological Variability

The mistake:
Biological variability is inherent and unavoidable. Assuming uniform performance across animals, tanks, or cohorts without accounting for natural variability can misrepresent product efficacy for normal fluctuations in growth, survival or health. Even when fish are sourced from the same population and managed under the same the conditions, they will have a natural variance in performance. Trials that are designed without taking this into consideration can create misleading results.

How to avoid it:
Biological systems are inherently complex, so it is important to build trial designs that anticipate this and builds safeguards that allow true treatment effects to emerge clearly. It’s important to work with your CRO and design trials with variability in mind. Through proper randomization, sufficient sample sizes, and robust statistical planning you can reduce the risk that comes from individual animals differing in genetics, behaviour, and stress response. This leads to stronger confidence in trial outcomes.

Inconsistent Monitoring and Data Collection

The mistake:
Even the best designed trials can go off the tracks if it includes irregular sampling, incomplete records, or inconsistent methods across the trial. What is measured is important to a trial outcome, however how consistently and reliably it is collected over time will ultimately determine the quality of the data collected. Gaps in data make it difficult to understand trends, timing of effects, or cause-and-effect relationships. Data that lacks consistency is harder to analyze, slower to report, and more vulnerable to challenge. This can lead to seemingly promising results that cannot be used to support regulatory submissions, commercial claims or customer discussions.

How to avoid it:
Standardizing monitoring protocols and data collection methods from day one is the most effective way to protect the integrity of a trial. Consistency ensures data integrity and simplifies analysis and reporting. This reduces unintended variation introduced by human judgement or changing conditions over time. Onda operates with established SOPs, trained personnel, and quality oversight systems designed to ensure consistency from the first day of a trial to the final report. Our role is not only to execute the protocol, but to enforce discipline in monitoring, documentation, and data handling.

Well-designed aquaculture trials reduce uncertainty, save time and cost, and accelerate decision-making. Avoiding these common mistakes starts with thoughtful planning, scientific rigor, and experience across species, systems, and regions. We partner with clients from protocol development through execution and analysis to help ensure trials generate data you can trust. If you’re planning an upcoming study or reassessing an existing trial design, we’re always happy to talk.