Vol. 19 No. 1 (2012): March 2012

The effect of cholesterol on the survival and development of larval mud crab Scylla serrata were examined by feeding larvae with Artemia enriched with different level of cholesterol. Artemia enriched with four stated levels of cholesterol i.e., 0, 5, 10, and 20 ul/l (Chol 0, 5, 10, and 20). All treatments were mixed with DHA70G at 25 ul/l.  All the oil was adjusted to 100 ul/l by adding the oleic acid. Survival rate, intermolt period, and carapace width at the fisrt crab stage of mud crab larvae fed Chol 0, 5, and 10 were higher compared to that of Chol 20 (P < 0.05). We suggest that free sterol contained in Artemia at 1.37% was harmful to the growth performance of mud crab larvae. This study suggests that mud crab larvae required at least 0.61% cholesterol for maintaining good survival and development and therefore no need to enrich Artemia by cholesterol for the practical purpose.

Microalgae concentrates (paste) can be used as an alternative feed to replace live microalgae for aquaculture due to its nutritional value and convenience. However, the clumping of cells and negative buoyancy of algae concentrate can affect bivalve culture as bivalves only capture particles in suspension and ingest a certain size range of particles. This study investigated the effect of shaking and blending treatments on the preparation of food suspensions prepared from algae concentrates (Isochrysis and Pavlova). The results indicated that the higher the shaking time (5, 10, and 15 times) or blending time (10, 30, and 60 seconds), the smaller was the diameter of the resulting algae particles. Moreover, the greater the volume of algae concentrate used in preparation, the larger the diameter of algae particles produced. Shaking may be the best option because it is cheaper and simpler. However, all the treatments provided a suitable particle size range for ingestion by bivalves.