Aquatic animals are highly adaptable, requiring around 40 essential nutrients that can be sourced from various raw materials, including marine ingredients, animal products, grains, and novel sources. This adaptability is crucial to the industry's growth and will allow for diverse feed formulations.
Changing feed formulas can be challenging, as new materials must meet stringent requirements to maintain growth, feed conversion rates, robustness, health, and welfare. Fishmeal, for example, is highly stable and rich in digestible protein and essential amino acids, making it an important part of the diet. Successful replacement of fishmeal with plant-based proteins requires careful nutrient supplementation, such as amino acids, to avoid growth and welfare issues.
Marine oils, another key component, supply essential omega-3 fatty acids like EPA and DHA, which are critical for maintaining robustness and immune health under modern farming conditions. Replacing these oils with alternatives requires careful supplementation of fat-soluble vitamins. BioMar’s R&D team has gained extensive knowledge in transitioning from marine ingredients to processed animal products, plant-based proteins, and more recently, novel sources.
Single-cell marine algae, have successfully supplemented marine fish oils, providing essential DHA and EPA fatty acids. After over 10 years of research, BioMar found that algal oils can fully replace fish oil with no negative impact on growth, feed conversion, or product quality across different species and farming stages.
Algal oil has been used in salmon, shrimp, and marine fish feeds, achieving commercial scale with over 4 million tonnes of BioMar feed sold containing this novel oil source while prices remained competitive compared to other DHA and EPA sources.
Other novel raw material sources are following a larger-scale commercial implementation, trials have shown that insect meals can be included at high levels of protein replacement, with no adverse effects. Freshwater salmon fed insect meal have demonstrated strong growth and robustness, potentially benefiting from a nutrient profile similar to their natural prey.
Larger, full commercial scale validation trials are now underway, at a number of customer sites. Shrimp and marine fish have similarly shown good feed intake and survival rates.
Single-cell proteins, including bacterial meals, fungi, and yeast, are being studied by BioMar's innovation team. Yeast protein has shown strong performance at 20% inclusion with no differences observed in growth or feed conversion. In addition to growth performance, these single-cell protein sources contain important cell wall components like b-glucans, mannan oligosaccharides, lipopolysaccharides, and peptidoglycan. These compounds can potentially stimulate immune responses over long-term feeding, influencing immune and physiological pathways.
Advanced techniques such as transcriptomics, metabolomics, microbiota analysis, and histology have been used to assess these factors. So far, results have shown no unwanted upregulation of the immune system, and single-cell proteins are proving promising for long-term feeding.
The ability of fed aquatic species to derive nutrients from a wide range of sources is driving a dynamic and diverse raw material basket for aquafeeds. As the aquaculture industry continues to grows the demand for both existing and novel raw materials will rise. These new nutrients sources are not only essential but are proving to be highly beneficial in supporting the health, welfare and robustness of aquatic species.
Results (7)
Yellowtail kingfish (Seriola lalandi) is a highly valued marine species known for its rapid growth and high market price. Predominantly farmed in sea cages in regions such as Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and Mexico, this species is now being explored for recirculating aquaculture systems in Europe and the USA.
The global aquafeed industry has undergone a significant transformation over the past two decades, shifting from marine-based ingredients to plant-based raw materials. This transition has linked aquafeed production more closely with the environmental and social impacts of agriculture. Sustainable raw material sourcing is critical, given that aquafeed production accounts for up to 80% of the scope 3 greenhouse gas emissions in salmon farming.
Iron (Fe) is a crucial trace mineral involved in various biochemical processes in fish. For Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar L.), the dietary iron requirement ranges from 60 to 160 mg/kg. However, these requirements were established using purified diets with highly bioavailable iron forms, and may not reflect the needs in practical diets where interactions with antinutrients such as phytate can affect iron bioavailability.
The shrimp aquaculture industry faces significant challenges due to suboptimal culture conditions and susceptibility to opportunistic pathogens like Vibrio parahaemolyticus. Given the underdeveloped immune system of shrimp, these factors can lead to high mortality rates and economic losses.
Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) farming industry frequently faces the challenge of managing sea lice infestations, which necessitates mechanical treatment procedures that can stress the fish. Handling stress from crowding and delousing can negatively impact fish appetite and growth, leading to economic losses.
Largemouth bass (Micropterus salmoides) are a crucial freshwater aquaculture species in China, facing challenges like high water temperatures that cause significant economic losses. One promising solution is using functional feeds with natural antioxidants.
Managing sea lice infestations in Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar L.) aquaculture often involves mechanical treatments that can cause acute stress, reducing feed intake and compromising growth.