1. Introduction
Although Brachionus plicatilis was first identified as a pest in
the pond culture of eels in the fifties and sixties, Japanese researchers soon
realized that this rotifer could be used as a suitable live food organism for
the early larval stages of marine fish.
The successful use of rotifers in the commercial hatchery operations of
the red sea bream (Pagrus major) encouraged investigations in the
development of mass culture techniques of rotifers. Twenty five years after the
first use of rotifers in larviculture feeding several culture techniques for
the intensive production of rotifers are being applied worldwide. The
availability of large quantities of this live food source has contributed to
the successful hatchery production of more than 60 marine finfish species and
18 species of crustaceans.
To our knowledge, wild populations of rotifers are only harvested in one
region in the P.R. China, i.e. the Bohai Bay saltworks where
Brachionus plicatilis is used as food in local hatcheries of Penaeus
chinensis. The success of rotifers as a culture organism are manifold,
e.g. planctonic nature, tolerance to a wide range of environmental
conditions, high reproduction rate (0.7-1.4 offspring.female-1.
day-1). Their small size and slow swimming velocity (This is a Quick Time
movie).. slow swimming velocity(This is a Real Player
movie).. make them a suitable prey for fish larvae that have just resorbed
their yolk sac but can not ingest the bigger Artemia nauplii yet.
The largest potential for rotifer culture resides, however, in the
possibility of rearing these animals at very high densities. Even at high
densities, the animals reproduce rapidly and can thus contribute to the build
up of large quantities of live food in a short time.
1.Introduction
2. Morphology
3. Biology and Life History
4. Strain Differences
5. General Culture Procedures