Heritability and genetic correlation for residual feed intake of Pacific abalone Haliotis discus hannai

Abstract

Pacific abalone (Haliotis discus hannai) is the dominant farmed abalone species in China. Feed efficiency is an important economic trait for abalone, but little attention has been paid to this trait in breeding programs of Pacific abalone. In this study, the growth and feed efficiency traits of 648 abalone were measured during two time periods (days 1–36 and days 37–72), while an individual-based accurate measurement method of feed efficiency for abalone was established. The residual feed intake (RFI) was first evaluated in abalone; this was significantly correlated between the two periods, while the feed efficiency ratio (FER) was not significantly correlated between the two periods. Genetic analysis showed that RFI exhibited moderate or high heritability, with respective scores of 0.32 and 0.40 in the two periods, and there was a strong positive genetic correlation between the two periods (0.892 ± 0.042). RFI showed weak negative genetic correlations with average daily gain (ADG) during the two growth periods (−0.144 and − 0.008), and a positive genetic correlation with daily feed intake (DFI) (0.901 and 0.794). In addition, a group-feeding experiment were carried out on 12 families. It was found that the body growth and feed intake of abalone were highly correlated with the results of individual-feeding experiment. The results demonstrated that RFI could be used as a suitable trait for indicating the feed efficiency of abalone in future breeding programs.