Background and objective: Biofloc application has been introduced in aquaculture in order to reduce the nutrients level and sustain good water quality. Due to its importance, a study was conducted to identify the effect of biofloc application on shrimp growth performance, specific growth rate and survival rate in a closed hatchery system.
Materials and methods: Molasses as carbon sources were applied in ratio 10:1 for biofloc formulation and no addition of molasses in non-biofloc (clear water) treatment. One way ANOVA was applied to analyze the differences between biofloc treatments and clear water.
Results: The survival rate of the shrimp was ranged between 23.69 and 98.77% for biofloc treatment, whereas 98.15-99.23% for non-biofloc treatment. The lowest survival rate (23.69%) was due to vibriosis infection in one of the biofloc treatment tanks. Growth performance was identified expedite in biofloc especially in (dark green) colour biofloc as compared to non-biofloc. The Specific Growth Rate (SGR) for Body Weight (BW) was identified expedite around (3.25-4.06) g day-1 for biofloc treatment compared to non-biofloc around (2.74-3.93) g day-1. The SGR for (TL) also identified expedite around (2.12-2.45) cm day-1 for biofloc, compared to non-biofloc (clear water) around (1.71-2.13) cm day-1.
Conclusion: It can be concluded that the biofloc application successfully improved the shrimp performance and at the same time become the additional natural diet to the shrimp respectively. However, further study needs to be conducted to improve the survival rate and prevent vibriosis infection by using the biofloc system in the future.
Keywords: Biofloc technology; P. vannamei; ecosystem; growth; molasses; survival; whiteleg shrimp.