Effect of Replacing Dietary Fishmeal with Soy-Based Products on Production Performance of Near Commercial Size Cobia, Rachycentron canadum.

of a thesis at the University of Miami. Thesis supervised by Dr. Jorge A. Suarez. No. of pages in text. (31) Fish meal replacement experiment was conducted with cobia above 1.77 ± 0.3 kg. The fish were fed one control diet and three experimental diets, for duration of 91 days. All diets were formulated isonitrogenous and isoenergetic and supplemented with amino acid mix. The control diet was similar to commercial diet formulations. Two experimental diets were formulated in which 67% of protein from fishmeal was replaced by: a) a combination of dehulled SBM+ Soy Protein Concentrate (Solae Profine®) labeled as MXSB diet, and b) a combination of Soy Protein Concentrate (Solae Profine®) + Schillinger NavitaTM labeled NavitaTM diet. In the NavitaTM diet, the Soybean meal was completely replaced by SG-NavitaTM. The final experimental diet was formulated to replace 80% of protein from fishmeal by a combination of Schillinger NavitaTM+ Soy Protein Concentrate (Solae Profine®) labeled NavitaTM Extreme diet. Results showed no significant differences between all four diets in most performance criteria (FCR, PER, FE, MDI, GPI, and GEI). Data also showed no significant differences in MR, VSI, and HSI. These results concluded that no physiological alterations occurred when fish were feed high levels of soy-bean replacement diets. There existed significant differences in FIFO ratios between diets. Data showed that NavitaTM extreme produced the lowest values, which reached as low as 0.91 ± 0.16. Our findings suggest that NavitaTM has a high potential to serve as a fishmeal replacement in aquaculture feeds.