Commercial Shrimp Feed Usage as Guppy (Poecilia reticulata) Fry Feed: Effect for Growth Performance, Liver Histology, Pigmentation, and Stress Tolerance

Purpose: Species-specific aquafeed confirms better results in commercial aquaculture, providing optimized nutrition for each species. However, cost-effective shrimp feeds are frequently used in the ornamental fish industry due to their benefits, such as growth and pigmentation enhancement. These facts were not tested, and therefore, this experiment was conducted to fill a research gap and explore the effectiveness of shrimp feed.
Research Method: A commercial fish feed was used as the control (FF) at 3% of body weight (BW) and with a feeding frequency of 2 times/day. Fish were fed the shrimp feed (SF) at 3%BW and 2/day (SF(3.2)), 3%BW and 4/day (SF(3.4)), 6%BW and 2/day (SF(6.2)), and 6%BW and 4/day (SF(6.4)).
Findings and Values: The SF(6.4) and SF(6.2) fish groups achieved the highest growth performance compared with the control. Regression analysis curves proved that the growth performance of the SF(6.4) group was higher than that of the SF(6.2) group. Moreover, the SF(3.4) group achieved higher growth than the control, whereas the SF(3.2) group showed no statistically difference in growth compared with the control. All the SF-fed groups gained a higher colour intensity than the control. The SF feeding did not adversely affect the stress tolerance or survival of the fish. Shrimp feed effectively gains the weight and pigmentation of ornamental fish. However, feeding frequency and rate should be controlled to avoid hepatic alterations.