Micro-agriculture techniques for the sustainable production oflive feed organisms in the laboratory

Indian coastal waters harbour diverse groups of microalgae or phytoplankton such as diatoms, dinoflagellates, blue green algae, silicoflagellates and cocolithophores together constituting nearly 95% of primary production in the marine ecosystem. In mariculture, these microalgae form the main live feed organisms during the early developmental stages of commercially important marine finfishes, crustaceans and molluscs. Hence marine hatcheries maintain stock cultures of diatoms and dinoflagellates for producing mass cultures for feeding requirements. The marine hatchery complex at Calicut Research Centre of CMFRI maintains stock cultures of eight species of live feed organisms