PERFORMANCE OF SOY PROTEIN AND SOY OIL UTILIZED IN FEEDS FOR JUVENILE RED DRUM Sciaenops ocellatus

Two nine-week feeding trials were conducted with juvenile red drum to assess their performance on feeds utilizing high levels of soy protein and soy oil as fishmeal and fish oil replacements. During the first trial, fish were fed soy based diets included either 36 g 100g^-1 solvent extracted soybean meal (SBM) or soy protein concentrate (SPC) and graded levels (0%, 25%, or 50%) of soy oil replacing fish oil. These feeds were compared to two fishmeal based feeds, one which contained a 50% replacement of fish oil with soy oil (Table 1). Based solely on performance metrics (growth rate, weight gain, and feed conversion ratio), the highest performing dietary formulation was selected as the base formulation for the second feeding trial.

The second feeding trial introduced a graded level of soy protein inclusion to examine possible soy protein and soy oil interactions on overall performance. A fishmeal based diet with fish oil as the lipid sources was used as a reference diet again and a natural diet of cut fish, squid, and shrimp was introduced as one treatment to assess maximum growth potential within the system.

Performance results from both feeding trials will be discussed as well as proximate compositions of fillet and whole body tissues from each trials.