tons, of that shrimp farming is booming beyond 2.5 million tons (FAO, 2012). Because of their fast growth, high market value, and resistance to disease the Pacific white shrimp (Litopenaeus vannamei) is particularly suitable for intensive cultivation (Williams et al., 1996; Liu et al., 2012). Currently, the Pacific white shrimp is the most single valuable aquaculture commodity (FAO, 2012). In fact, the production of this shrimp generated US $11 billion in 2010. However, over 90 percent of these farmed-raised shrimp rely on high protein diets and typically contains high percentages of fish meal and fish oil. As a result, this has created a large concern, considering how fish oil is expensive. Likewise, shrimp diet costs can account for between 50-80 percent of a producer's operational costs which directly influences profitability. As a way of relieving this concern, while maintaining/optimizing total growth of the shrimp, a clear-water culture system was used to culture Pacific white shrimp while fed eight (8) different experimental practical diets. Notably, diets were formulated by Dr. Vikas Kumar to evaluate the ability of algal meal as a partial or complete replacement of more expensive fish oil.
This study was conducted to determine optimal levels of algal meal as an oil source replacement for fish oil in diets for Pacific white shrimp while evaluating overall growth performance and nutrient utilization.
The outline of the experiment is presented in Figure 1. Shrimp diets were formulated to replace fish oil with combinations of Schitzochytrium algae meal, linseed oil, and soybean oil. Other ingredients such as fish meal, soybean meal, wheat meal, wheat gluten, and vitamins and minerals were formulated to meet the known nutrient and energy requirements of shrimp (Table 1).