Leopard coral grouper, Plectropomus leopardus are a heavily exploited, high‐value fish commonly found in the Asian live reef food fish trade. In past decades, many attempts at the mass culture of various grouper species have been undertaken; however, their small mouth gape at first feed has resulted in very low survival when using traditional live feeds such as rotifers. The use of wild caught or extensively cultured copepods has yielded potentially promising increases in survival and growth, but overall survival to the juvenile stage remains low, making mass culture currently impractical. The current study sought to build on past developments in grouper culture and recent advancements in copepod culture technology by observing how growth and survival were influenced by the addition of intensively cultured copepods to the early diet of P. leopardus larvae. Six tanks of larvae, three replicates per treatment, were fed either eggs and nauplii of the calanoid copepod Parvocalanus crassirostris, at a starting density of 5 mL⁻¹, and the rotifer Brachionus rotundiformis, at a starting density of 10 mL⁻¹, or were fed only B. rotundiformis, at a density of 15 mL⁻¹, starting on the evening of 2 days post‐hatch (dph) and continuing until 9 dph. After this initial period, all larvae were fed the same diet of rotifers, Artemia, and dry feed until the cessation of the trial at 21 dph. Larvae fed P. crassirostris in addition to rotifers had a significantly higher survival, 9.9 versus 0.5%, than those fed only rotifers. Growth was also significantly enhanced in larvae offered copepods. Larvae only fed rotifers were, on average, 1.5 mm shorter at 21 dph than those that had been fed copepods. More rapid development and the earlier onset of flexion were also noted in the larvae that were offered copepods. The use of intensively cultured copepods, in this study, increased survival tenfold over previous studies, with P. leopardus larvae fed wild‐caught copepods. The application of intensively cultured copepods to the early diet of P. leopardus, along with future research to evaluate late‐stage mortality issues, may facilitate commercial production of this species.

中文翻译：

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精养Parvocalanus crassirostris nauplii幼虫豹珊瑚（Plectropomus leopardus）的存活和生长

豹珊瑚石斑鱼，Plectropomus豹是在亚洲活礁食用鱼贸易中常见的，被大量开采的高价值鱼。在过去的几十年中，已经进行了许多对各种石斑鱼物种进行大规模培养的尝试。但是，在使用传统的活体饲料（如轮虫）时，初次喂食时它们的小口间隙导致存活率很低。野生捕捞或广泛养殖的pe足类动物的使用已潜在地提高了存活率和生长，但到幼年期的总体存活率仍然很低，因此目前不可行大规模养殖。本研究试图通过观察豹纹石斑鱼的早期饮食中添加的集约化pe足类动物对生长和存活的影响，从而在石斑鱼养殖的过去发展和co足类鱼类养殖技术的最新进展的基础上发展。幼虫。六罐幼虫，每个处理重复三次，喂养或者蛋和无节幼体的哲水蚤桡足类Parvocalanus水蚤，在5 mL的起始密度^-1，和轮虫臂rotundiformis以10mL的起始密度，^-1，或喂食仅B. rotundiformis，在15 mL的密度^-1，起始于2天孵化后（DPH）晚上并持续至9 DPH。在此初始阶段之后，所有幼虫都饲喂相同的轮虫，卤虫和干饲料，直到试验以21 dph停止。幼虫饲养的P. crassirostris除轮虫外，与仅喂食轮虫的人相比，轮虫的存活率明显提高，分别为9.9％和0.5％。幼虫提供的co足动物的生长也显着增强。仅以幼虫喂养的轮虫在21 dph时平均比以co足类动物喂养的轮虫短1.5毫米。pe足类动物的幼体也注意到发育更快，屈曲更早开始。在本研究中，使用豹culture幼虫饲喂野生co足纲动物，集约化co足纲动物的存活率比以前的研究提高了十倍。将集约化的pe足类动物应用于豹纹斑the的早期饮食，以及评估后期死亡率问题的未来研究，可能会促进该物种的商业化生产。