Evaluation of Growth Performance of Tachypelus gigas (Muller, 1785) under Two Different Culture System

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Materials: The specimen and materials used in this study were 6 month-old T. gigas larvae. The larvae were produced from trough artificial fertilization using T. gigas brood stock captured from the wild. Other materials used were Recirculating Aquaculture System (RAS), rearing trays, micrometer and analytic balance, water testing kits, Artemia nauplii and seawater.

METHODS

Recirculating aquaculture system, RAS: Generally, this system involved the water recirculation from the rearing trays into the mechanical and biological filters and the sterilized through UV light before being return to the rearing tray. In RAS, the mechanical and biological filter both functioned to filter to solid waste and remove ammonia from the system. Polyethylene (PE) tray were arranged to resemble drawers which can be pulled out for monitoring and maintenance purposes.

Feeding: Artemia nauplii was used as live feed for the horseshoe crab larvae. In this study, about 2.5 to 3.5 g of Artemia eggs were hatch everyday. Seawater with 18-20 ppt was used as a media for the culture. Artemia cysts were incubated for 24 h and the resulted nauplii were fed to horseshoe crabs larvae. Larvae was feed to station twice a day.

Water testing kit: There were five main water parameters measured in this study. The kits or apparatus used were; the refractometer (salinity), pH meter (pH), DO meter (dissolved oxygen and temperature) and ammonia kit (ammonia-nitrogen). Measurements were taken twice a week.

Size and weight increment: The larval growth was accomplished by molting their exoskeleton. Size and weight were measured after each molt. This measurement was carried out using a digital caliper (prosomal width measurement) and an analytical balance (body weight measurement). Length and weight measurements were carried once a month throughout out the culture period. Larvae were monitored daily to observe mortality and molting.

Molting: In order to grow, the larvae of T. gigas molt many times during their lifetime. The molting process depends on the relative growth. After molting, the size of T. gigas larvae becomes larger than before. Prosomal width and weight on horseshoe crab larvae were measured after each molting.

Statistical analysis: Data for prosomal width and weight increments by using t-test to compare the two rearing methods used.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

In this study, only prosomal width and weight were measured since the width considered as being the most reliable indication of the size increment and yields the smallest error in measurement (Sekiguchi et al., 1988). In this study, it was found the T. gigas larvae molt 3 times during the 6 month-old culture period. Three stages of body size increments for T. gigas larvae were observed for both RAS and conventional method. The result were as shown in Table 1.

Table 1:	Means data collected and result statistical analysis t-test for weight (g) and prosomal width (mm)
Mean±SD of body sizes (mm) of T. gigas larvae reared in RAS and conventional method. RAS: Recirculating aquaculture system, C: Conventional method. S: Significant different (p<0.05)

Fig. 1:	Effect of RAS on total weight increments compared to conventional method

The weight and prosomal width of T. gigas larvae for both systems were significantly different (p<0.05). This indicated that the different rearing methods namely the RAS and conventional method influence the increments in the prosomal width and weight of the larvae.

Figure 1 showed the final prosomal width achieved for T. gigas larvae cultured in RAS and conventional method was 27.99 and 23.50 mm, respectively. The final weight increment achieved for T. gigas larvae cultured in RAS was 0.92 and 0.61 g for conventional method (Fig. 2). The first molt occurred when larvae reached 187 days old, second at 250 days old and third at 278 days old for both RAS and conventional method. Therefore, RAS resulted in significantly better width and weight increments as compared to the conventional method. However, there was no different in molting frequency of T. gigas larvae cultured using these two methods using.

Estimation of molting frequency of T. gigas: Similar to other arthropods, horseshoe crabs must molt in order to grow. When an individual is ready to molt, a new soft and folded exoskeleton begins to form beneath the old one. The old carapace splits along the forward edge, allowing the animal crawl out. After molting, the size of T. gigas larvae is larger than before. In this study, it was found that the T. gigas larvae molted 3 times during the 6 month’s cultured period. T-test results in Table 2 showed that the molting frequency for different molting stages for T. gigas larvae cultured for 6 month using RAS and conventional method was not significantly different (p>0.05). The animal will be stress in higher or lower solenoids so it will delays the deposition of calcium on the exoskeleton (Soundarapandian and Raja, 2008).

Fig. 2:	Effect of RAS on prosomal width increments compared to conventional met

Table 2:	T-test for the molting frequency at different molting stages for T. gigas larvae
Mean±SD (standard deviations) of molting frequency of T. gigas larvae reared in RAS and conventional method. RAS: Recirculating aquaculture system, C: Conventional method. NS: No. of significant different (p>0.05)

Table 3:	Range of molting frequency of different molting stages for T.gigas larvae
RAS: Recirculating aquaculture system, C: Conventional method

Both RAS and conventional culture method have no effect on the molting frequency at different molting stages for T. gigas reared from 6 to 11 moth-old. The range of molting frequency of different molting stages for RAS and conventional method is shown in Table 3.

Generally, the molting frequency of horseshoe crab larvae was observed to decrease against their age. The decreased in the molting frequency is basically due to the longer time needed for the larvae to grow until the exoskeleton could not longer contain them and then the molting occurs. The bigger larvae grow, the longer is the time taken for it to molt. During the molting process, some T. gigas larvae were unable to move out from their older shell, thus resulted in the mortalities of the larvae. Great amount of energy during the molting process may have caused this mortality. Overfeeding can be detrimental to the larvae. Artemia given as food will compete with the larvae for oxygen especially in the conventional method. Poor water quality is also a factor to be considered contributing to detrimental effect on the larvae. Particularly, the DO and ammonia in the culture water quite different between the two systems.

Advantage of using RAS as compared to conventional method: This study showed the advantages and disadvantages of using RAS and conventional method for the culture of T. gigas larvae. In RAS, optimal water quality is being maintained and this provides a suitable condition for the culture of the horseshoe crab larvae. Although the initial cost of setting the system is higher but in the long term, it is more advantages and cost saving as compared to the conventional method, whereby the frequent water change will incur high cost. For the optimum growth and increasing biofilter efficiency and temperature are important in RAS (Rahman et al., 2012). During cultured period, it was observed that the T. gigas larvae cultured using the conventional method gets infected with fungus as compared to RAS (Fig. 3, 4). Ultraviolet installed in RAS sterilized and eliminated pathogens ultheaviolet, therefore reducing reduced disease problem for the T. gigas larvae.

Fig. 3:	T. gigas larvae reared in Recirculating Aquaculture System (RAS) appeared free from infection

Fig. 4:	T. gigas larvae reared in the conventional method showing fungal infection on shell

CONCLUSION

Based on the finding of this study, it can be concluded that culture method using RAS produced significantly better growth of T. gigas larvae as compared to the conventional method T. gigas larvae were generally easier to maintain under RAS in the laboratory as compared to the conventional method. RAS provides a solution for water quality problems such as dissolved oxygen DO and ammonia. Overall, RAS has more advantages, especially in reducing water wastage, human recourses and space requirements.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The authors thank to Fundamental Research Grant Scheme (FRGS) phase 2/2010 Ministry of Higher Education Malaysia (MOHE) for providing this fund. Special thanks also to the Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) for facilities provided for this research.