Reducing phosphorus emissions from net cage fish farming by diet manipulation

To alleviate the environmental impact of net cage fish farming in terms of phosphorous (P) emissions to the Baltic Sea, this study aimed at developing and documenting a diet concept for large rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) in brackish water (∼15 ppt) that minimizes the excretion of dissolved P and reduces the excretion of particulate P without compromising fish performance and gonadal development. This was to be achieved by reducing the total dietary P content and matching dietary bioavailable P concentrations to fish requirements using whole-body P concentration and expected individual raw material digestibility as criteria. The diet concept was firstly tested in a laboratory mass-balance study with all female rainbow trout (∼1100 g fish⁻¹) fed three commercial-like low-P diets with 0.74% total P, 0.67% total P, or 62% total P plus phytase. Comparing the highest and lowest P diets showed that it was possible to reduce the excretion of dissolved P by 87% to 0.08 g dissolved P kg⁻¹ biomass gain without compromising P requirements and fish performance. To verify the concept on commercial scale, an 8 mm P-reduced test diet with 0.63% total P and targeted a bioavailable P concentration of 0.41% by adding phytase was tested against a commercial control diet with 0.81% total P, feeding each diet to four commercial net cages for 5½ months. Harvest data along with ovary and whole-body P analysis confirmed that there were no performance differences between treatment groups, further sustaining that the specific P discharge may be reduced from an estimated 5.1 to 3.2 kg P t⁻¹ fish produced by minimizing the total dietary P content while tailoring the bioavailable P concentration to match fish requirements. Applying the diet concept to the current (2020) Baltic salmonid production could theoretically reduce P emissions by 147 t yr⁻¹ including 79 t dissolved P and 68 t particulate P.