Fiji has a strong demand for shrimp but farmers have hard time meeting the demand due to inadequate knowledge
of local ingredients. A nutritional study was conducted to evaluate the growth performances of juveniles of the freshwaterprawn species Macrobrachium rosenbergii. The prawns were fed with low cost formulated diets using locally availableingredients. Two experiments were conducted with six different diets in each of the experiment. In Experiment 1, dietswere mainly based on carbohydrate ingredients ( fish meal+wheat, Fish meal+meat bone meal+wheat, Fish bonemeal+fish meal+wheat, Meat bone meal+wheat, Meat fish meal+fish meal+wheat and Meat fish meal+wheat). Whilediets for Experiment 2 were based protein ingredients ( Fish meal+wheat, Fish meal+meat meal, Fish meal+meatmeal+crest tilapia pellet, Fish meal+meatmeal+copra meal, Fish meal+wheat+pea meal and Crest tilapia pellet).Each experiment (6 diets x 3 replicates) was carried out in the laboratory. Juveniles were fed twice a day for a periodof three and four weeks in Experiment 1 and 2 respectively. Results indicated no significant (P>0.05) differences inwater quality parameters. All nitrate, nitrite and ammonia concentrations were less than 0.2 mg/L. Fat and crude fibercontents were lowest and highest respectively in crest pellet tilapia (4.60% and 17.98%). Experiment 1 showed slightvariations in growth performance. In Experiment 2, crest tilapia pellets indicated better result in weight gain (7.04 ± 2.96 mm), carapace, abdomen and body length (4.74 ± 1.94, 5.57 ± 0.62 and 5.57 ± 0.62), specific growth rate ( 2.38 ± 0.53) and feed intake (1.31 ± 1.19).However, no significant differences (P ≥ 0.05) were observed in either of the experiments. The costs of making each feed was almost same (0.53–0.58 Aus $/Kg). The findings indicate that the ingredient inclusion level for local ingredients available in Fiji could be quite flexible and used successfully for the growth of fresh water prawn juveniles (M .rosenbergii)
