Microbial risk assessment of livestock-integrated aquaculture and fish handling in Vietnam

Animal manure has been traditionally used to fertilize fish ponds in Vietnam. While this practice effectively reuses agricultural wastes, high concentrations of pathogenic microorganisms in animal manure raise public health concerns. Working in fish ponds and handling of contaminated fish in unhygienic manner were identified as potential factors of occupational risk. Escherichia coli occurred in numbers <10³ colony forming units (CFU)/100 mL in irrigation water and <10⁴ CFU/100 mL in fish pond water that uses animal manure. Escherichia coli on tilapia skin in numbers were <10³ CFU/100 cm in excreta-based systems and <10¹ CFU/100 cm in feed-based systems, respectively. The study identified direct use of animal manure as major contributors of the fecal contamination of pond water as well as skin of cultured fish. Estimated risks of enteric infection were 100–1000 times higher than the US Environmental Protection Agency acceptable risk. While these risk values are not likely to accurately predict infection rates in Vietnam, they indicate a potential occupational risk in the long term. Therefore, a need for risk mitigation measures was realized for health protection of future generation in agricultural communities.     

Developing native fish species for aquaculture: the interacting demands of biodiversity, sustainable aquaculture and livelihoods

Aquaculture continues to be the fastest growing animal production industry and this rate of expansion must continue if aquaculture is to satisfy global demand for fish products in the face of dwindling capture fisheries. The relationship between aquaculture and biodiversity is complex, with examples of positive and negative impacts having been reported. To enable this expansion while avoiding negative impacts from introductions of exotic species, the investigation of indigenous species becomes important and worthwhile.This paper establishes the background to development of new species for culture and describes the example of the Mexican silverside Menidia estor, which has for centuries been the principal species in an artesanal fishery in Lake Pátzcuaro, Mexico. The species is geographically isolated and is unique but is now endangered because of a range of factors including overfishing, environmental degradation and introduction of exotic species. Considerable advances have been made recently in developing a closed reproductive cycle, understanding feeding and small‐scale on‐growing technology for the species. Based on this, a Darwin Initiative programme was developed focused on technology transfer to implement small‐scale pilot on‐growing thus helping to conserve the species and to improve livelihoods. This has allowed successful pilot scale development of aquaculture for the species while at the same time addressing the objectives of the international Convention on Biodiversity.     

Levels of domestication in fish: implications for the sustainable future of aquaculture

The agricultural world today is dominated by a few domesticated mammal species, that is, animals modified from their wild ancestors through selective breeding in captivity for traits beneficial to human usages. As a result, a clear dichotomy exists between wild (from hunting) and domesticated mammals (produced in farms) used for human consumption. Similar to agriculture, aquaculture is often viewed as the only solution that can provide more fish products given that harvesting wild stocks have reached an upper limit. Aquaculture is considerably younger than agriculture relying on natural sources to farm numerous species. To better describe the diverse strategies for fish production, we propose a new classification comprising five levels of ‘domestication’ with 1 being the least to 5 being the most domesticated. Our classification places 70% of the 250 farmed finfish species recorded in the 2009 FAO database into levels 1, 2 and 3 representing a transitory form of fish production dependent on the availability of the wild resource. In contrast, only a few species, or more accurately populations, can be considered truly domesticated, similar to cattle or sheep. Based on this classification, two scenarios for the future of aquaculture are discussed: either the industry focuses on few truly domesticated species, similar to the path taken by agriculture, but avoiding its negative impacts or aquaculture proceeds with inter‐specific diversification by focusing primarily on the domestication of native species.     

Probiotics in aquaculture: The need, principles and mechanisms of action and screening processes

Aquaculture production of molluscs is worth US$11 billion per year and represents 65% of World mollusc product. A significant limitation to the industry is loss of stock through bacterial disease. Traditional methods to combat disease with antibiotics have been questioned and alternatives have been sought. The field of probiotics as well as the screening methods used to acquire probiotic strains for the alternative management of disease in aquaculture is discussed. This review provides a comprehensive summary of probiotics in aquaculture with special reference to mollusc culture.     

Applications of fish nutrition research in aquaculture: the Taiwan experience

Fish is an important dietary animal protein in Taiwan. Fish production has increased from 20 000 tonnes (t) in 1938 to over 300 000 t today. The change in feed inputs from trash fish to formulated feeds enabled industrial production of fish food. Nutrition studies for shrimp began in the 1970s and continue today. Stable ascorbic acid derivatives have allowed industrial production of shrimp feeds and the development of the extensive production systems in Taiwan and elsewhere in Asia.     

Price and production trends in the marine fish aquaculture in Spain

The Spanish aquaculture sector has undergone a rapid and continuous growth becoming one of the biggest European producers. A wide range of species are farmed and, among them, the sea bass, sea bream and turbot make a significant contribution to the total of the Spanish fish farming output. In this paper, we analyse and predict the medium-term trend of the production and price level for the three leading species previously mentioned. The results obtained show a significant increase in the production of sea bream, sea bass and turbot. The results show also a slight decrease in the sea bream average price, a stable trends for the sea bass and increasing prices for the turbot.     

南海北部沿岸鱼类分类学多样性的空间格局

鱼类自动识别在海洋生态学、水产养殖等领域应用广泛。受光照变化、目标相似、遮挡及类别分布不均衡等因素影响,鱼类精准自动识别极具挑战性。提出了一种基于多阶段特征提取网络 (Multi-stage Feature Extraction Network, MF-Net) 模型进行鱼类识别。该模型首先对图片作弱增强预处理,以提高模型的计算效率;然后采用多阶段卷积特征提取策略,提升模型对鱼类细粒度特征的提取能力;最后通过标签平滑损失计算以缓解数据的不平衡性。为验证模型的性能,构建了一个500类、含32 768张图片的鱼类数据集,所建模型在该数据集上的准确率达到86.8%,优于现有的主流目标识别方法。利用公开的蝴蝶数据集对该模型进行泛化性能验证,多组消融实验进一步验证了所提算法的有效性。

     

Biosensors for the assessment of fish health: a review

Fisheries Science - Methods that can be used to check the health of fish, determine their physiological condition and detect abnormalities at an early stage, have been attracting recent attention....     

玻璃钢水槽内大黄鱼养殖环境噪声测量与分析

利用水下声音测量系统,分别记录了开放式圆形玻璃钢水槽内养殖环境噪声和大黄鱼(Larimichthys crocea)摄食过程声音,并进行声压级(sound pressure levels,SPL)计算和频谱特征分析。结果表明:(1)养殖环境噪声SPL约为110.27 d B(d B re:1μPa),包括主频率峰值为100 Hz的养殖工作设备与水槽内壁的低频共振噪声、1 250 Hz的表层水体气泡噪声、1 600~2 500 Hz的曝气石、增氧机、空气压缩机工作噪声;(2)增氧机和曝气关闭时,大黄鱼摄食过程声音SPL约为92.65 d B,高于背景噪声SPL,主要为游泳声音70~500Hz、吞食产生的水体表面搅动与气泡破裂的声音1 000~2 000 Hz、咀嚼颗粒饵料声音2 000~4 500 Hz;(3)增氧机和曝气开启时,背景噪声SPL略高于摄食声音约17.62 d B,且摄食声音无法区别于背景噪声,但并未影响鱼类摄食行为。     

Microbial communities in various waters used for fish larval rearing

A major concern in larvae production is a mass mortality caused by fish diseases. In larvae production, pumped‐up natural seawater filtered through a sand filter system is used for fish rearing, and microalgae and rotifer cultures. Here, we investigated the community structures of eukaryotic microbes, as well as total bacteria and vibrios, in various processed ‘waters’ used in a larvae production site. We observed that ultraviolet irradiation of seawater was effective to reduce not only total bacteria and vibrios but also eukaryotic microbes. Moreover, the community structures of total bacteria and vibrios in rearing waters for fish larvae were different from those in rotifer cultures fed with Chlorella, but rather similar to those in natural seawater and microalgae cultures. These results suggest that the bacterial community in rearing waters may originate mainly from natural seawater and then be selected by microalgae in rearing water. Overall, this study provides useful information for avoiding the risk of fish disease outbreaks in a larvae production site.     

Use of fluidized bed biofilter and immobilized Rhodopseudomonas palustris for ammonia removal and fish health maintenance in a recirculation aquaculture system

Intensive recirculating aquaculture relies on biofilters to sustain satisfactory water quality in the system. Fluidized bed and immobilized cell technologies were used to remove ammonia from the water and maintain fish health. A high‐rate nitrifying fluidized bed biofilter combined with valveless filter was designed for use in a recirculation aquaculture system (RAS). The suspended solids produced during fish culture could automatically be removed using a valveless filter. Natural porosity with fitting proportion, steady fluidization and expanding rate was chosen as the fluidized carrier. The technology of bacterial separation and cultivation was used. The immobilized Rhodopseudomonas palustris (R. palustris) produced through a biotechnologically embedding medium is suitable for fish and could help prevent diseases. Nitrification was promoted through the selective rearing of nitrobacteria in a fluidized bed biofilter. Water quality was improved using fluidized bed biofilter and immobilized R. palustris in the RAS. In addition, the proposed system was able to reduce costs. Maximum fish load was 45 ± 3 kg m^?3 in the closed recirculating water fish culture system, and water use was reduced by 80–90%. The total ammonia nitrogen removal rate of the technology was 80–95%, and nitrite N removal rate was above 80%.     

Application of the consortia of nitrifying archaea and bacteria for fish transportation may be beneficial for fish trading and aquaculture

The growing popularity of the aquarium trade is greatly increasing the demand for many ornamental fish. While shipping technology has made the worldwide transportation of ornamental fish possible, a significant portion of the fish caught for the aquarium trade perish in transport before being sold to hobbyists. One of the major causes of fish death in transport is ammonia building up to toxic levels in the shipping bags. In order to solve this problem, we investigated the effectiveness of using nitrifying consortia in reducing the ammonia build‐up in marine fish bags during transport. A pre‐activated nitrifying consortium was effective in safely maintaining low ammonia levels during a three‐day experiment. We found that both ammonium chloride and urea can activate nitrifying consortia. Activation of nitrifiers by urea is not only novel but also beneficial due to being less harmful to fish in comparison with ammonia. We also discovered that unexpectedly one nitrifying consortium examined mainly contained ammonia‐oxidizing archaea. The confirmation of the concept of the use of activated nitrifying consortia and the usefulness of nitrifying archaea for fish transportation may be beneficial for the fish trading and aquaculture.     

Microbial hydrolytic enzyme activity in the sediments of a net cage aquaculture area

Potential microbial extracellular leucine-aminopeptidase (LAP) and β-glucosidase (βGlc) activity in the sediments of a red sea-bream (Pagrus major) aquaculture area were measured. Temporal variations in these enzymatic activities were low and stable from December 1999 to April 2000. They rose but fluctuated widely from May to November 2000. LAP activity in the sediments ranged from 334 to 4461 nmol/g per h in the 0–1-cm layer and from 106 to 258 nmol/g per h in the 4–5-cm layer. βGlc activity ranged from 221 to 4121 nmol/g per h in the 0–1-cm layer and from 18 to 238 nmol/g per h in the 4–5-cm layer. These values were higher than others reported and the organic matter load from the fish farms appeared to promote these enzymatic activities, although the relationship was not linear. The ratio of LAP to βGlc was smaller than other reported values in marine sediments or in water samples from the same aquaculture area, suggesting that not only quantitatively but qualitatively an aspect of organic matter degradation in the sediment might be changed by the heavy supply of organic materials from fish farms.     

An integrated recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) for land-based fish farming: The effects on water quality and fish production

To mitigate the serious water pollution caused by the rapid expansion of the aquaculture industry in recent years, the development of improved aquaculture systems with more efficient water usage and less environmental impact has become essential. In this study, a land-based recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) was established that consisted of purification units (i.e., a primary biological pond, two parallel horizontal subsurface flow constructed wetlands [CWs], and a long ecological ditch) and 4-5 series-connected recirculating ponds. This system was mainly designed to stock channel catfish (Ictalurus punctatus), fifteen spine stickleback (Spinibarbus sinensis) and yellow catfish (Pelteobagrus fulvidraco), and the culture efficacy was evaluated based on a 2-year field experiment covering two growing seasons. According to the results, the primary biological pond played a role in sedimentation or nutrient retention, although this was not as evident when the CWs were functioning. The water flowing through the wetland system at a hydraulic loading rate (HLR) of 600 mm/day displayed lower values for the temperature, pH, dissolved oxygen (DO), suspended solids, organic matter and nutrients, whereas the electrical conductivity (EC) was higher, suggesting the accumulation of dissolved solids in the system. Due to the recirculation treatment, the trophic status of the recirculating ponds increased gradually along the direction of the flow and was notably lower in comparison to the control. As a result, the fish production responded to the variation of the water quality, which was reflected in the measurements of culture efficacy (final weight, survival rate, SGR and yield). The three main rearing species showed a decreasing trend along the direction of the flow, which was higher compared to the control, whereas an opposite trend was observed for filter-feeding fish. A Pearson correlation analysis revealed that the main culture species were inclined to live in meso- or oligotrophic conditions, and the silver carp adapted to more eutrophic conditions. Because RAS can provide better environmental conditions year-round, the present culture method could be more suitable for species that are sensitive to water quality in typical subtropical areas.     

The benthic environmental footprint of aquaculture in the Eastern Mediterranean: Organic vs conventional fish farming

A field experiment was carried out in a fish farm of the Eastern Mediterranean in order to evaluate the benthic environmental footprint of the organic versus the conventional fish farming. The highest values of chl α were recorded at the conventional culture during both studied seasons. The organic matter and organic carbon rates recorded at the conventional culture were significantly higher than those observed at the organic culture in both studied seasons (p < .05). Furthermore, in all cases the quality characteristics of benthic community variables were optimum at the organic culture compared to the conventional one and similar to those of the control. SIMPER analysis showed that the maximum average dissimilarity occurred between organic and conventional culture, while the main contributor species for this dissimilarity was the polychaete Capitella capitata. Multidimensional scaling (MDS) ordination plot indicated clearly a separation of the organic and conventional fish farming during both studied seasons. K‐dominance curves revealed a clear difference in elevation, mainly during summer. M‐AMBI index showed a poor to moderate environment for conventional culture, while organic one was good to high and similar to the control site (high). The results indicated the lower environmental footprint of the organic fish farming compared to the conventional, demonstrating its potential as an important management tool, which could play a significant ecological role for the sustainability of aquaculture in the Mediterranean region.     

Indirect selection for growth and life-history traits in Indian carp aquaculture: 1. Effects of broodstock management

Artificial selection for genetic improvement is not carried on in Indian fish hatcheries. However, the process of selection of potential breeders and artificial propagation involves indirect selection, the nature of which will be determined by the type of breeders selected for breeding.The present study is focused on females belonging to two carp species, Labeo rohita and Cirrhinus mrigala, from two fish farms in Karnataka State, south India. Quantitative estimates of pre-reproductive growth rate, age at first spawning and size at first spawning were obtained by a confirmatory factor analysis of measurements made on fish scales. Phenotypic correlations and the resulting correlated selection intensities during a single episode of selection have been estimated. The intensity of indirect selection was negative for pre-reproductive growth rate and positive for age at first spawning. This indicates an undesirable tendency to breed slower growing and later maturing individuals in both farms.     

养殖池底层鱼类电脉冲捕捞装置设计与试验

为了减轻土池养殖底层鱼类的捕捞劳动强度,提高捕捞效率,研制了具有脉冲宽度和脉冲频率可调、工作状态指示、报警等功能,以及操作简单、使用方便的助渔仪器。文章主要介绍鱼类电行为特性、水中脉冲放电产生的电场对鱼类行为作用的机理、系统电气性能参数和系统功能的确定、硬件实施及效果等。     

冷水鱼循环水养殖中的低温氨氮处理技术研究

为解决冷水鱼养殖过程中养殖水体中的氨氮累积问题,根据低温生物滤器及臭氧催化氧化处理氨氮的特点,设计了冷水鱼工厂化养殖氨氮处理系统并进行了试验。试验基于以臭氧氧化为主、低温生物处理为辅的处理工艺,试验鱼为虹鳟鱼,养殖密度为23 kg/m3,试验水体约为10 m3,试验周期为7 d。结果表明,该系统能够满足冷水鱼工厂化养殖过程中有关氨氮处理的水质指标要求,处理后的养殖池进水口的水质指标总氨氮≤0．18 mg/L,硝酸盐氮氮≤29．43 mg/L,亚硝酸盐氮氮≤0．1 mg/L;养殖水体氨氮浓度监测表明,臭氧在水中残留低于0．008 mg/L,符合养殖鱼类对水体臭氧浓度的安全要求。     

Biomonitoring using tagged sentinel fish and acoustic telemetry in commercial salmon aquaculture: A feasibility study

We tested if it is technically feasible to monitor fish in real-time in full-scale commercial fish farms using acoustic telemetry. 31 Atlantic salmon were equipped with acoustic transmitter tags containing depth sensors. Tagged fish were monitored for three months in two industrial scale sea-cages containing 180000 and 150000 fish, respectively. Each cage was fitted with two prototype acoustic receiver units designed to collect, interpret and store the information transmitted by the acoustic transmitter tags. Ten in each cage were also equipped with Data Storage Tags (DSTs) containing depth sensors to record individual-based datasets for comparison with the acoustically transmitted datasets. After compensation for sample loss caused by expected acoustic interference between the transmitter tags, the resulting dataset revealed that the receiver units collected 90–95% of the signals in both cages. Acoustic communication conditions in the sea-cages were not strongly impaired by factors such as fish density and local noise. Further, the dataset from the acoustic transmitters had comparable resolution and quality to that produced by the DSTs. However, acoustic tags provide data in real time and enable farmers to respond to the received information with farm management measures, whereas archival tags such as DSTs need to be retrieved and downloaded and hence have no real-time applications. We conclude that acoustic telemetry is feasible as a method to monitor the depth of fish in real-time commercial aquaculture.