Transitioning to a Pelleted Diet and Compensatory Growth of Pacific Goliath GrouperEpinephelus quinquefasciatusin Captivity

Abstract

The objective of this study was to adapt juvenile Pacific goliath grouper to a diet of pelleted feed. Groupers were captured in nature, individually marked, and randomly assigned to two groups. One group was fed pieces of raw fish and the second group a pelleted feed. The experiment lasted 12 weeks, and adaptation to the pelleted feed was done gradually. Fish growth, weight gain, and specific growth rate (SGR) were estimated. The Student's t-test, at the 0.01 level of significance, was used to compare SGR means. All the fish survived. The rate of growth for grouper fed pieces of raw fish was 1.6 g per day. Although the groupers fed the pellets lost weight at the beginning of the experiment, at the end their SGR was 5.5 grams per day. The average weight gain for juvenile grouper fed pellets was 14.6 ± 4.1 g per day.

Feeding management and appraisal of recirculating aquaculture system for spiny lobster Panulirus spp. weaning

“…This gradual adaptation process takes approximately one month to achieve the best growth of lobsters. Goliath grouper (Epinephelus quinquefasciatus) requires an even longer period of adaptation, lasting ten weeks, with a gradual change of 20% every two weeks [15]. Another practice, known as co-feeding, which involves a mixture of live and pellet feed, is applied to pikeperch (Sander lucioperca) [16].…”