Nutritional enhancement of artemia parthenogenetica using sargassum wightii as dietary supplement

Three replicas of 5 glass bowls containing seawater medium were inoculated with Artemia parthenogenetica at the concentration of 1000 instar I nauplii and the 1st bowl was fed with rice bran alone (control) while the 2nd , 3rd, 4th, and 5th bowls were fed with rice bran as well as 250mg, 500mg, 750mg and 1000mg Sargassum powder respectively. On 35th day, Artemia were collected, dried and analyzed for nutritional enhancement. Sargassum powder provides some extra amounts of crude proteins, dietary fibers, essential amino acids, long chain fatty acids, minerals and vitamins in addition to the normal amounts supplied by rice bran. Hence, the concentration of these nutritional components increased with increase in the dosage of Sargassum powder up to 500mg/day but higher dosages (750mg and 1000mg) do not influence the nutrients enhancement due to the constrain of feed intake of Artemia. The correlation coefficients of increase in the total essential amino acids were r= +23 (P<0.05) at 250mg dosage, r= +27 (p>0.05) at 500mg dosage, r= +26.2 (p<0.05) at 750 mg dosage and r= +26.1 (p>0.005) at 1000 mg dosage of Sargassum powder in relation to the values in the control. The correlation coefficients of increase in the total fatty acids were r= +21 (P<0.05) at 250mg dosage, r= +26 (p<0.05) at 500mg dosage, r= +24 (p>0.05) at 750 mg dosage and r= +24.1 (p>0.005) at 1000 mg dosage of Sargassum powder per day. This study therefore recommends the growers to use the maximum of 500mg Sargassum as a feed supplement to Artemia for nutritional enrichment.