TOWARDS THE BETTER USE OF SOY BASED DIET FOR FLORIDA POMPANO Trachinotus carolinus: USE OF NOVEL SOY PROTEIN CONCENTRATE AND SQUID PRODUCTS

Soybean meal and soy protein concentrate have successfully been demonstrated as alternative choices of protein sources in formulated diets for Florida pompano. However, low performance of the fish is consistently observed when animal protein is completely removed from the diet. To explore possible improvements to plant based feeds, NutriVance (NV), a novel soy protein concentrate was used to replace poultry by product meal (PBM, 15% diet) on an iso-nitrogenous basis. The animal free diet was then supplemented with graded levels of squid meal and squid hydrolysates replacing NV. Each dietary treatment was tested in quadruplicate groups of 20 Florida pompano (mean initial weight 7.68 g) per tank. Fish were offered each diet to near satiation over an 8 week growth trial. Fish maintained on the diet containing 15% PBM were larger and had the lowest FCR. Similar performance was obtained in fish maintained on diet containing 4% squid hydrolisates. The results demonstrate that diets containing 100% plant based protein sources are not viable and low levels of animal based proteins are required to improve performance. Series of histology, mineral and proximate analysis of fish were also conducted and will be reported.