Availability of amino acids from various fish meals fed to Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar)

Amino acid availability values for Atlantic salmon were evaluated for two steam- and one flame-dried herring meal, menhaden meal, anchovy meal, and a Norwegian capelin meal (Norse-LT94(R)). Apparent amino acid availabilities were calculated based on feces collected either by manual stripping or sedimentation (Guelph CYAQ-2 digestibility system). Apparent crude protein availability values obtained from manually stripped feces showed that Norse-LT948(R) (87.0%) was not significantly different from any of the herring meals (82.6 and 85.1%) tested but was higher (P <0.05) than from both the anchovy (76.7%) and menhaden meals (78.2%). Availabilities calculated with values from feces collected by sedimentation were approximately 9% higher than those from manually stripped feces due to leaching of faecal constituents. The amino acid availability values of common feedstuffs should be used for feed formulation as their availability within a feed ingredient is quite variable.