Growth and survival of spiny lobster, Panulirus homarus fed fresh food and formulated diet

Abstract

To date, lobster aquaculture relies on fresh food for feeding; however, the availability of fresh food is limited and its excessive use causes environmental degradation. Therefore, formulated diet is required to establish sustainable lobster aquaculture. Concerning this issue, this study was carried out to assess the growth and survival of spiny lobster Panulirus homarus fed fresh food and formulated diet. The study was conducted in a completely randomized design (CRD) with 3 groups of treatments and 3 replicates for each treatment. Feeding experiment was performed in a flow-through water system using 9 fibre tanks, 4000 L in volume. Each tank was stocked with 40 lobsters, with initial weight of 78.08 ± 0.22 g. Each group of lobsters was fed with fresh food (A), formulated diet (pellet) (B) and a combination of pellet and fresh food (C). The fresh food was a mixture of fish, crabs, shrimp and small mussel (3:1:1:1). Feeding experiment was done for 15 weeks. Results of the experiment showed that the highest specific growth rate of lobster was obtained from lobsters fed with the combination of pellet and fresh food (0.52 ± 0.02 %/day) and the lowest growth was resulted from lobsters fed formulated diet (0.16 ± 0.03 %/day). In contrast, the highest survival was achieved in lobsters fed formulated diet (51.67%). Whereas the lowest survival was found in lobsters fed fresh food (10%). This study indicated that good growth of lobster was resulted from feeding with formulated diet combined with fresh food, while good survival was supported by feeding with formulated diet.

Fish and shrimp hydrolysate as additives in lobster feed formulation: effect on growth, survival, feed consumption of spiny lobster (Panulirus homarus)

“…Previous research shows that lobster growth was obtained from lobsters fed a combination of pellets and fresh food. This was probably caused by the better nutrient balance in the combination of pellet and fresh food, which supported better lobster growth [22]. This experiment results indicated various studies of lobster feed are needed to develop lobster feed, especially to formulate palatable and high-performance dry pellets to support lobster grow-out [9].…”

“…The high lipid values were contributed by fish meal, fresh fish, fresh mussels, fresh crab, and fish oil. Fish, shrimp, and small mussels indicated a relatively high content of lipids [22].…”

“…Therefore the water quality could be maintained properly. These water quality parameters were classified as optimum for lobster mariculture [22].…”

The impact of fresh and artificial diet on growth and survival rate of spiny lobster, Panulirus homarus reared in floating net cage

“…Lobsters are known as a valuable crustacean that has high economical value in the market. The demand of lobsters are high not only in domestic, but also in international market [1]. To fulfil the demand of the market, lobster supply still depend on capturing activities.…”

“…A combination of fresh and artificial feed for grow-out of lobster had been experimented in controlled tanks [1]. The result of this experiment showed that the combination of fresh food and formulated diet gave better growth performance, but the survival rate was better when the lobster were fed formulated diet.…”