The digestibility of whole and dehulled lupins (Lupinus angustifolius) fed to juvenile greenlip abalone, Haliotis laevigata

摘要

The apparent digestibility of protein, amino acids, and gross energy from whole and dehulled lupins (Lupinus angustifolius) and defatted soyflour was investigated for greenlip abalone, Haliotis laevigata Donovan. Protein digestibility of all three feedstuffs was high with a coefficient of 0.91 obtained for soyflour and whole lupins and a coefficient of 0.92 obtained for dehulled lupins. Gross energy digestibility was much more variable with the energy from soyflour being significantly more digestible (coefficient of 0.87) than that from dehulled lupins (coefficient of 0.83), which was significantly more digestible than the energy from whole lupins (coefficient of 0.50). The significantly lower energy digestibility of the whole lupins compared with the dehulled lupins could possibly be due to abalone's poor ability to digest cellulose, which is the major component of the hull of L. angustifolius.