Kumlu, M.-1997
The Israeli Journal of Aquaculture - Bamidgeh, 49(4) : 199-204
Abstract:
In this study, the effect of different diets on the survival and trypsin-like activity of a calanoid copepod Temora longicornis were investigated in the laboratory. The animals were starved or fed live algae (Diet A), a microencapsulated diet (Diet B), or the microencapsulated diet plus frozen algal cells (Diet C) for 10 days.
The highest survival (69%) was obtained with those fed Diet A, whereas the lowest (11%) with the starved control (p<0.05). At the end of the experiment, animals fed Diet C displayed a significantly better survival (53%) than those fed Diet B (32%; p<0.05). Measurement of trypsin-like activity revealed that the animals adapted their digestive enzymes to live or dead algal cells more rapidly (within 24 h of feeding) than to formulated diet particles (after 5 days of feeding). The animals fed Diet A had the highest trypsin-like activity (p<0.05). Addition of frozen algal cells into the culture (Diet C) induced a significantly higher trypsin-like activity over Diet B fed animals (p<0.05). It seems that proteolytic enzymes of copepods feeding on artificial or live feeds have similar responses to other planktonic decapod crustaceans feeding at the primary consumer level.
(University of Cukurova, Faculty of Fisheries, 01330 Balcali, Adana, Turkey)