The effects of starvation and re-feeding on growth and swimming performance of juvenile black carp (Mylopharyngodon piceus)

Abstract

We investigated the effects of starvation and re-feeding on growth and swimming performance and their relationship in juvenile black carp (Mylopharyngodon piceus). We measured the specific growth rate (SGR), resting metabolic rate (RMR) and constant acceleration test speed (U CAT, the maximum swimming speed at exhaustion by constant acceleration test with 0.1667 cm s(-2) rate) in a treatment group (21 days of starvation then 21 days of re-feeding) and control group (routine feeding) (n = 20). Starvation resulted in a 17 % decrease in body mass of black carp (P < 0.05). After 21 days of re-feeding, body mass was greater than that of pre-starvation but still less than that of the control group at 42 days. During the re-feeding phase, the SGR of the treatment group was higher than that of the control group (P < 0.05). Starvation resulted in a significant decrease in the RMR and U CAT. After 21 days of re-feeding, both the RMR and U CAT recovered to the pre-starvation levels. In the control group, individual juvenile black carp displayed strong repeatability of the RMR and U CAT across the measurement periods (P ≤ 0.002). In the treatment group, RMR showed significant repeatability between pre-starvation and re-feeding (P = 0.007), but not between pre-starvation and starvation or between starvation and re-feeding. U CAT showed significant repeatability between pre-starvation and starvation (P = 0.006) and between pre-starvation and re-feeding (P = 0.001), but not between starvation and re-feeding. No correlation or only a weak correlation was found between any two variables of RMR, U CAT and SGR, whereas the increment of the U CAT (ΔU CAT) was negatively correlated with that of SGR during the starvation phase (r = -0.581, n = 20, P = 0.007) and re-feeding phase (r = -0.568, n = 20, P = 0.009). This suggested that within individual black carp, there is a trade-off between growth and maintenance (or development) of swimming performance under food-limited conditions.

COMPENSATORY GROWTH OF Oreochromis niloticus SELECTED STRAIN FROM BOGOR, WEST JAVA

“…No significant difference in body weights and biomass was found bet-ween one-week deprived group and the group without feed deprivation. Similar effects of feed deprivation on growth and body composition were also reported in previous studies (Oh et al, 2007;Morshedi et al, 2013;Yengkokpam et al, 2014;Pang et al, 2016). The present study showed that tilapia were unable to compensate weight losses during two weeks of feed deprivation period, which resulted in significantly lower body weight and biomass compared to the other groups at the end of the experiment.…”

Digestive and locomotor capacity show opposing responses to changing food availability in an ambush predatory fish

“…Similar downregulation of SMR has been noted in other species, possibly as an adaptation to reduce energy expenditure during food deprivation, but generally after a longer time period without food ( O'Connor et al, 2000 ; Yang and Somero, 1993 ). For example, black carp ( Mylopharyngodon piceus ) only show a 30% decrease in SMR after 21 days of fasting at 25°C, whereas, in the present study, southern catfish showed a 60% decrease in SMR after 2 weeks ( Pang et al, 2016 ). In the current study, it is possible that changes in spontaneous activity within the respirometers may have contributed to the observed differences in estimated SMR among feeding periods.…”

“…During refeeding, fish showed an extreme increase in body size, with their average mass increasing by more than 3-fold after 15 days refeeding, a rate much faster than most fish species under comparable conditions ( Pang et al, 2016 ). In general, the southern catfish is a very fast-growing species, with more than 60% of ingested energy being channeled to growth and potentially reaching 3–4 kg in their first year when food is abundant [with maturation occurring at about 5–7 years ( Xie and Sun, 1987 )].…”

“…For many fish species it is not uncommon for individuals to survive days, weeks or months without eating during periods of overwintering or eutrophication during the summer ( Biro et al, 2004 ; Hervant et al, 2001 ). Extended periods of starvation in fish can be accompanied by a reduction in SMR ( O'Connor et al, 2000 ; Pang et al, 2016 ; Yang and Somero, 1993 ), possibly as an adaptive response to reduce energy expenditure, although effects on other metabolic traits are less well known. Locomotor ability is also reduced by long-term food deprivation ( Killen et al, 2014 ; Martínez et al, 2004 , 2002 ), presumably due to protein degradation and reduced function of aerobic and anaerobic enzymes in muscle tissue.…”

Effects of food availability on metabolism, behaviour, growth and their relationships in a triploid carp

“…Metabolic rates are typically thought to have important impacts on fitness, and interindividual variation in metabolic rate is thought to be repeatable over time (Norin and Malte, 2011). Somatic growth is one of the most fundamental biological processes required for survival and thus has important fitness consequences, and growth rate is frequently used as an indicator of the capacity to acquire food resources (Arnott et al, 2006;Stephen et al, 2006;Pang et al, 2016a). It has long been suggested that maintenance metabolism (i.e.…”