Trial culture of marine shrimp Litopenaeus vannamei postlarvae under three feeding strategies

Alimentary supplementation with artemia has been showing excellent results in shrimps' larval growth; however, the use of artemia as the only feeding source, especially in hatcheries, can turn this activity economically unviable due to this input high price. The objective of this work was to submit Litopenaeus vannamei postlarvae (PL) to different alimentary strategies and evaluate their growth (weight and length) and survival rate. The research consisted on three treatments with three replications each. In the first one, it was administered commercial ration only. In the second, PL were fed with commercial ration and artemia biomass (Artemia salina) and, in the third, with ration, artemia biomass and the microalga Spirulina platensis. Initial stock density was 0.7 pl/L and PL (PL 10) were placed in 30 L useful volume aquariums and fed ad libitum three times a day. Data were submitted to a one-way variance analysis (ANOVA) and the Tukey's test, both with a significance level of 5%. PL weight means were not significantly different between ration + artemia and ration + artemia + spirulina, while ration only treatment differed from the others and presented the smallest average weight. Length means showed significant differences among all treatments, and ration + artemia + spirulina treatment presented the highest mean. There were no significant differences in individuals' survival means and they were elevated in all treatments. Nevertheless, the use of artemia biomass and S. platen is as alimentary complements resulted in length and weight improvements of L. vannamei PL.