A study of feeding in the shrimpFarfantepenaeus subtilisindicates the value of species level behavioral data for optimizing culture management

Abstract

This study characterized a number of the behaviors of Farfantepenaeus subtilis in response to the offer of feed at different times during a 24 h cycle. Shrimp were observed under laboratory conditions during 12 h light-12 h dark cycles, before and immediately after feeding. The behaviors recorded were: burrowing, substrate exploration, vertical exploration, ingestion, swimming, inactivity, and crawling. The frequencies of all these behaviors increased in the presence of food, independent of time or light phase. The consumption of feed was more frequent in the morning. The results showed that the rhythm of activity is influenced by the light-dark cycle and the availability of food. The results are different from those reported for other shrimp species and indicate the potential value of understanding the behavioral details of each species for optimizing their management.

Influence of stocking density on the behaviour of juvenileLitopenaeus vannamei(Boone, 1931)

“…In turn, Silva et al . () verified that individuals of the species F. subtilis fed more frequently in the first hours of the light phase.…”

Social status and individual behavioral differences in juvenileMacrobrachium rosenbergii

“…This pattern was also observed in other species (F. subtilis and Litopenaeus vannamei) exposed to artificial conditions. Behaviors such as exploration and crawling also show elevated levels during the offering of food, and this trend is independent of the light phase (Pontes & Arruda 2005;Silva et al 2012). Macrobrachium borelli exhibits increased foraging at night in its natural environment and this is associated with high general activity during this phase (Collins 1997).…”

“…This behavior is an important component of the search for food and environmental recognition, and exploration often involves animal movement (Patullo & Macmillan 2005;De Lima et al 2009). In Farfantepenaeus subtilis, also during juvenile phase, the highest level of exploration coincided with the highest intake of food, despite the fact that the behavior did not differ between light phases (Silva et al 2012).…”

“…Behaviors related to the behavioral activity profile were adapted from an ethogram of other species of shrimp (Silva et al 2012). The following categories were recorded:…”

Behavior activities of Macrobrachium rosenbergii (De Man, 1879) in monosex and mixed populations, in the laboratory

“…Ethological studies have been applied to shrimp farming Arruda 2005a, 2005b;Pontes et al 2006;Lima et al 2009;Silva et al 2012;Santos et al 2013;Silva and Arruda 2014;Santos et al 2015;Santos and Pontes 2016), particularly for freshwater shrimps of the genus Macrobrachium. In fact, several research works deal with the prawn´s morphology (Brody et al 1980;Cohen et al 1981;Ra'Anan and Cohen 1985;Ra'Anan and Sagi 1985;Kuris et al 1987;Ra'Anan et al 1991), agonism (Barki et al 1991;Sousa and Singer-Brugiolo 2001;Balasundaram et al 2004;Short 2004;Karplus 2005), zootechnical performance (Du and Niu 2003;Lan et al 2006) and animal performance in monosex cultures (Nair et al 2006;Santos et al 2015).…”