New approaches for growth improvement in pejerrey Odontesthes bonariensis culture

SOLIMANO, P. J.; GARCIA DE SOUZA, J. R.; MAIZTEGUI, T.; BAIGÚN, C. R. M.; COLAUTTI, D. C.

NEOTROPICAL ICHTHYOLOGY

SOC BRASILEIRA ICTIOLOGIA

Lugar: Porto Alegre; Año: 2015 vol. 13 p. 213 - 220

1679-6225

The argument has been that pejerrey culture must overcome specific problems to become a productive resource. A principal biologic drawback is the poor growth rate manifested under traditional rearing methods. Nevertheless, the growth limitations existing to date could theoretically be overcome by technical and biological developments and innovations. Our aim was to assess the possibility that through innovative culture methods the species might maintain high growth rates throughout rearing and to discuss if growth rates are truly a critical constraint for the development of fruitful pejerrey culture. Each of four floating cages installed at La Salada de Monasterio Lake was stocked with three hundred pejerrey. From January through March all fish were exposed to natural zooplankton as food source, whereas from April to September two cages were supplied daily with balanced food; the other two remained as controls. The artificial supplementary diets produced higher fish-growth rates than obtained in the control cages; those values also exceeded rates previously achieved by other culture methods during similar time periods. The results indicated that pejerrey could exhibit higher growth rates if fed accordingly, thus demonstrating that pejerrey culture could be improved by new scientifically based technology. [193 words]