Effects of bioflocs on dietary protein requirement in juvenile whiteleg Shrimp, Litopenaeus vannamei.

Yun, Hyeonho; Shahkar, Erfan; Katya, Kumar; Jang, In‐Kwon; Kim, Su kyoung; Bai, Sungchul C

A feeding trial was carried out to determine the effects of bioflocs on dietary protein requirement in juvenile whiteleg shrimp, Litopenaeus vannamei. Four bioflocs treatments ( BFT) and one control group were managed: BFT fed diets 25% of crude protein ( CP) ( BFT-25%), 30% CP ( BFT-30%), 35% CP ( BFT-35%) and 40% CP ( BFT-40%), and clear water control without bioflocs fed with 40% CP ( CW-40%). Triplicate groups of shrimp (initial body weight, 1.3 g) were fed one of the test diets at a ratio of 7% body weight daily for 8 weeks. At the end of the feeding trial, significantly ( P < 0.05) higher weight gain and specific growth rate were obtained in shrimp fed BFT-35% and BFT-40% compared to BFT-25% and BFT-30%. Shrimp fed BFT-35% exhibited the lowest feed conversion ratio. Significantly higher muscle nucleic acid indices were also recorded such as DNA content in BFT-30%, RNA content in BFT-35% and RNA/ DNA ratio than that of shrimp fed control. Total protein level in the haemolymph of shrimp fed BFT-40% was significantly higher than those of shrimp fed BFT-25% and BFT-30%. Therefore, the present results demonstrated that, when L. vannamei juveniles were reared in bioflocs-based tanks, dietary protein level could be reduced from 40% to 35% without any adverse effect on shrimp growth performance, body composition and haemolymph characteristics. [Correction added on 20 May 2015, after first online publication: sentence modified to clarify the reduction in dietary protein level.].

WHITELEG shrimp; LOW-protein diet; HEMOLYMPH; RNA; DNA

Aquaculture Research, 2016, Vol 47, Issue 10, p3203

1355-557X

Academic Journal

10.1111/are.12772