Comparative study on growth performance and survival of Indian major carps and male monosex tilapia in recirculating aquaculture system

An experiment was performed in a recirculatory aquaculture system (RAS) to carry out a comparative study on the growth performance and survival of Indian major carps (Labeo rohita and Gibelion catla) and monosex tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) fingerlings for a period of 90 days. Ten fingerlings each of L. rohita (average weight 30±0.1 g), G. catla(average weight 28±0.1 g) and O. niloticus (average weight 31.5±0.2 g) were distributed randomly into twelve cages, in quadruplicates. L. rohita and G. catla were fed commercial floating feed (30% crude protein and 5% crude lipid) ad libitum while O. niloticus were initially fed at 3% of the body weight upto 100 g size and was changed to 2% of the body weight. There was significant (p<0.05) increase of daily weight gain, percentage weight gain and specific growth rate (SGR) in O. niloticus followed by L. rohita and G. catla. Significantly lower (p<0.05) feed conversion ratio (FCR) and higher (p<0.05) protein efficiency ratio (PER), protein productive value (PPV) and lipid productive value (LPV) were found in O. niloticus followed by L. rohita and G. catla. At the end of the experiment, survival was similar for all three fish species, however total biomass was significantly (p<0.05) higher in O. niloticus followed by L. rohita and G. catla. The findings of this study showed the potential of RAS as an alternative to the pond culture of monosex tilapia and rohu.Keywords: Growth performance, Indian major carps, Monosex tilapia, Survival, Recirculatory aquaculture system