February 15-18, 2009 Washington State Convention Center Seattle ...

1 2
COMMERCIAL STANDARD PRACTICAL RESEARCH FEED FOR THE PACIFIC WHITE
SHRIMP, Litopenaeus vannamei
Addison L. Lawrence*, Susmita Patnaik, Warren Dominy, Ian Forster, Tom Zeigler and Tim Markey
Texas AgriLife Research Mariculture Laboratory at Port Aransas
Texas A & M System
1300 Port Street
Port Aransas, TX 78373 USA
Phone: 361-749-4625
Fax: 361-749-5756
smpall@yahoo.com
A commercial standard practical research feed is needed for conducting production studies in ponds and raceways, to evaluate
feed mill production methods effect on factors including feed physical and nutrient characteristics. A five week growth trial
was conducted to determine the growth and survival response to a proposed commercial standard practical research feed for the
Pacific White shrimp L. vannamei. A standard semi-purified research feed for the Pacific White shrimp L. vannamei has previously
been reported to support growth of L. vannamei from approximately 10 g to 30 g in size at a growth rate of 2.33 g/wk
and over 90% survival and has outperformed Rangen 35% and 40% commercial feeds by 20%. The study was conducted in a
recirculating indoor tank system (recirculation rate = 1636%/day and exchange rate = 25.8%/day) consisting of 102 rectangular
tanks (bottom area = 0.333 m 2 ) with L. vannamei at an initiation size of 0.5 g (SPF, Kona, Oceanic Institute, Hawaii). The
stocking density was 61 shrimp/m 2 . All treatments were fed at 2 g/shrimp/wk, 15 times a day by hand. All tanks were aerated
to maintain a minimum oxygen level of 5 ppm. The experiment was conducted at ambient water salinity and at a temperature of
29-31 °C. Both treatments had five replicates each. Total Ammonia Nitrogen (TAN), nitrite, nitrate and pH were monitored on a
weekly basis. At the study termination, shrimp were harvested and weighed for each tank separately. Water quality, and shrimp
harvest data including survival, growth, biomass and FCR were analyzed for statistical significance between the treatments.
Shrimp survival was 92.0 % to 88.0% for the standard commercial semi-purified diet and commercial standard practical diet,
respectively. Final weights were 8.57 and 7.99 g with estimated growth rates in the linear growth phase (above 3.5 g/shrimp) of
2.3 and 2.2 g/wk, respectively. These data showed that a growth and survival rate for the proposed commercial standard practical
research feed was not significantly different from growth and survival of the standard semi-purified research feed. Since
the standard semi-purified research feed has been showed to provide outstanding growth and survival to approximately 29-30 g
in size these data indicate that this commercial standard practical research feed would be very adequate to be used for raceway,
pond and tank productions and feed mill research. This commercial standard practical research feed is an open formulation.