Aquaculture Research, 2011, 42, 161^168 doi:10.1111/j.1365-2109.2010.02545.

Low-density culture of red abalone juveniles, Haliotis

rufescens Swainson 1822, recirculating aquaculture
system and flow-through system

Miroslava Vivanco-Aranda1, Cristian Jorge Gallardo-EscaŁrate2 & Miguel AŁ ngel del R|¤ o-Portilla1
1
Laboratorio de Gene¤tica, Departamento de Acuicultura, Centro de Investigacio¤n Cient|¤ ¢ca y de Ecuacio¤n Superior de
Ensenada Ensenada, BC, Me¤xico
2
Departamento de Oceanograf|¤ a, Centro de Biotecnolog|¤ a, Universidad de Concepcio¤n, Barrio Universitario s/n Casilla 160-C,
Concepcio¤n, Chile

Correspondence: M A del R|¤ o-Portilla, CICESE, Acuicultura, PO Box 434844, San Diego, CA 92143-4844, USA. E-mail: mdelrio@
cicese.mx

Abstract est in abalone culture for commercial and stock en-

Commercial abalone culture is carried out using
£ow-through systems with a high water volume ex-
change in Baja California, Mexico. The objective of
this work was to compare the growth rate and survi-
val of red abalone cultured in two systems. Flow
through (daily water exchange rate of 800%) and re-
circulating systems consisted of a 250 L ¢breglass
tank and constant aeration, but bio¢ltration in the re-
circulating system was provided with a 28 L (1ft3)
bubble-washed bead ¢lter.Water variables were mea-
sured either daily (dissolved oxygen, temperature, pH
and salinity) or three times a week (total ammonia
nitrogen, nitrate-nitrogen, nitrite-nitrogen and alkali-
nity). Shell length was measured every 2 weeks for 18
weeks. Only the alkalinity and pH were signi¢cantly
di¡erent due to the addition of sodium bicarbonate to
the recirculating system. Abalone growth rate was
26.1  15.96 mm day  1 in the recirculating systems
and 22.21  18.69 mm day^1 in the £ow-through sys-
tems. The ¢nal survival was 78.74% in the recirculat-
ing systems and 71.82% in the £ow-through systems.
Signi¢cant di¡erences in the ¢nal size and survival of
the abalones were found between systems (Po0.05).
Therefore, recirculating aquaculture systems is a fea-
sible alternative for juvenile red abalone culture.
Keywords: red abalone, Haliotis rufescens, recircu-
lating systems, growth, closed system
Introduction
Abalones, Haliotis, are marine gastropod molluscs,
with a high commercial value. There is a high inter-
hancement. In Baja California, abalone culture
started in 1984 with the red abalone, Haliotis rufes-
cens Swainson 1822 (Mazo¤n-SuaŁstegui, Mucino-D|¤ az
& Bazu¤a-Sicre 1996), although blue, Haliotis fulgens
Philippi 1845, and yellow, Haliotis corrugata Wood
1828, abalone culture are also of interest. The £ow-
through system is commonly used both commer-
cially and for stock enhancement. In this system,
water is constantly introduced to provide good water
quality to the organisms with an 800% daily water
exchange. This practice requires large amounts of
water to be pumped and, thus, yields a high cost.
Recently, the abalone industry has implemented
important technical changes to reduce costs and to
improve the production procedures, and recirculat-
ing systems are considered to be a feasible option to
reduce the pumping cost, but without reducing aba-
lone growth. Commercial recirculating systems have
been used for nearly three decades (Masser, Rakocy &
Losordo 1992). This type of system allows high envir-
onmental control and feasible cultivation conditions
as well as a reduction of water and land (Masser et al.
1992).
Abalone requires a good water quality to obtain
high growth rates (Basuyaux & Mathieu 1999) this
involves the control and monitoring of di¡erent phy-
sical^chemical variables. Among the most important
are the temperature, dissolved oxygen, pH, salinity,
concentrations of total ammonia nitrogen (TAN), ni-
trite-nitrogen (NO2-N), nitrate-nitrogen (NO3-N) and
alkalinity. In general, control of these variables
will provide good water quality for abalone growth
and development (Huchette, Koh & Day 2003). The

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Recirculating and £ow through red abalone culture M.Vivanco-Aranda et al.
objective of this work was to evaluate and compare
the growth rate and survival of red abalone cultured
in a recirculating and in a £ow-through system.
Materials and methods
Juvenile abalone
Seven-month-old red abalone (batch 200D, produced
by spawning 33 males and 73 females), were obtained
from the commercial farm ‘Abulones Cultivados S.A.
de C.V.’ located in Ejido Ere¤ndira, Baja California, Me¤x-
ico (31116 03300 N,116122 05300 W). Juvenile abalones were
separated from substrata using CO2 and were trans-
ported on a wet sponge in plastic bags with oxygen at
the Aquaculture Department (Departamento de Acui-
cultura) at the Centre for Scienti¢c Research and
Higher Education in Ensenada (Centro de Investiga-
cio¤n Cient|¤ ¢ca y de Educacio¤n Superior de Ensenda,
CICESE). After arriving at our facilities, individual se-
paration was not possible; thus, abalone distribution
was based on the weight of several abalones, which
were then transferred to culture systems. In each tank
50 g of abalones were placed, which corresponds to a
low stocking density of 0.070 kg m  2 570 g cm  2
(2265 organisms m  2).
Culture systems
One £ow-through system and one recirculating sys-
tem were used in the growth trial. Three individual
£ow-through systems, each one with individual
water supply plus three individual recirculating sys-
tems, were used. Each one of the recirculating sys-
tems consisted of a cylindrical £at-bottom ¢breglass
tank (250 L capacity) connected to a magdrive 500
pump (Danner Manufacturing, Islandia, NY, USA)
and a 28.31L (1ft3) bubble wash bead ¢lter (Aquacul-
ture System Technologies, New Orleans, LA, USA) as
a bioclari¢er (Malone & Beecher 2000), with a back-
wash frequency of two to three times a week. The
bead ¢lters were acclimated for 60 days at 20 1C be-
fore the experiment as recommended by Malone and
Beecher (2000). In the recirculating systems, the £ow
rate was 30 L min  1. The three individual £ow-
through systems consisted of similar tanks (250 L ca-
pacity) mentioned above. A £ow rate of 1.39 L min  l
was set in the three tanks for a daily water exchange
rate of 800%. The water used was pumped from the
ocean and ¢ltered to 70 mm before reaching the
tanks. Constant aeration was provided throughout
the experiment to both systems. The experiment
162 Aquaculture Research r 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd, Aquaculture Research, 42, 161^168
Aquaculture Research, 2011, 42, 161^168
lasted 4 months, beginning on 9 October 2003 and
concluding on 13 February 2004. Fifty grams of or-
ganisms were randomly allocated to each tank. The
initial mean shell length was 5.88  0.04 mm for
abalones maintained in the recirculating system and
6.21  0.01mm in the £ow-through system. All data
are average  standard error. Abalones were fed at a
ratio of 70% of abalone weight per week with Macro-
cystis pyrifera according to the alimentation of the
abalones in the commercial farms (N. Garc|¤ a, pers.
comm.). Every week, macroalgae were removed and
replaced with fresh ones.
Abalone and environmental variable
measurements
Every 2 weeks, the shell length of 50 randomly se-
lected animals per tank was measured using an elec-
tronic vernier calliper (precision to 0.01mm) model
S225 (Fowler Company, Newton, MA, USA). Every
day, temperature and dissolved oxygen were mea-
sured using an oxymeter model YSI 55 (YSI, Yellow
Springs, OH, USA). On 24 November, in both systems,
a heater (precision of  0.55 1C) model Pro Heat II
150 W (Won Brother’s, Fredericksburg, VA, USA) was
placed to maintain the temperature above 16 1C. Sali-
nity was measured using a temperature-compen-
sated refractometer (conventional refractometer)
and pH was measured using a Hanna Hi98127 meter
(Hanna Instruments,Woonsocket, RI, USA). Alkalinity
was measured two or three times a week with 1.6 N
H2SO4 and a bromcresol green-methyl red indicator
(Hach Company, Loveland, CO, USA). Because an alka-
linity concentration between 80 and 200 mg L  1 of
CaCO3 is optimal for bacterial survival in the bio¢lters
(Loyless & Malone 1997), when alkalinity values de-
clined below 100 mg L  1 of CaCO3, alkalinity was ad-
justed to 150 mg L  1 of CaCO3 with the addition of
commercial sodium bicarbonate, Iris quality (Smart
& Final, Tijuana, BCN, Mexico), to the recirculating
systems according to the method described by Loyless
and Malone (1997). The concentrations of TAN, NO2-N
and NO3-N were determined two or three times per
week using a saltwater master liquid test kit (Aqua-
rium Pharmaceuticals, Chalfont, PA, USA); for colora-
tion of each nutrient, the absorbance was read using a
spectrophotometer Shimadzu UV-1201 (Shimadzu
Scienti¢c Instruments, Columbia, MD, USA).
Statistical analyses
At the beginning of the experiment, abalone shell
lengths were compared among tanks with an ANOVA
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after assumptions of normality and homogeneity of

variances were met. At the end of the experiment,
the abalone shell lengths and the survival between
the two culture systems were compared using a cov-
ariance analysis (ANCOVA) to determine the di¡erences
among the slope of the two culture systems against
time. Di¡erences between treatment means were
considered to be signi¢cant at Po0.05. Growth rates
[(shell length at a given time  shell length at the
time of the previous measurement)/shell length at Figure 2 Growth rate of juvenile Haliotis rufescens in
the time of the previous measurement  100] were two culture systems. Mean  SE. Three £ow-through sys-
calculated for every period of measurement. Survival tem (n 5 50150150 at each time point). Three recirculat-
was estimated by counting empty shells at each mea- ing systems (n 5 50150150 at each time point).
surement time. For the di¡erent physical^chemical
variables (temperature, dissolved oxygen, pH, sali-
nity,TAN, NO2-N, NO3-N and alkalinity), paired t-tests
were carried out to determine whether there was a
tendency for the data to have a higher value between
culture systems using [recirculating datum]  [£ow-
through datum] to calculate the t-value in the t-tests
(paired comparisons, Sokal & Rohlf 1995). Statistical
analyses were carried out using MINITAB for WINDOWS
release 10.2 (Minitab, State Collage, PA, USA).

Results Figure 3 Survival (%) of juvenile red abalones Haliotis

The initial mean shell length (10 October) was
5.88  0.04 mm for abalones maintained in the recir-
culating system and 6.21  0.01mm in the £ow-
through system (Fig. 1). Signi¢cant di¡erences in the
initial abalone size were found between systems
(F(1,298) 5 12.25; Po0.01). The ¢nal mean shell length
was 9.17  0.03 mm for organisms in the recirculat-
ing system and 9.01  0.02 mm for organisms in the
£ow-through system (Fig. 1). Marginally signi¢cant
di¡erences were found between systems in the aba-
lone growth rate (F(1,2996) 5 4.16; P 5 0.04). There-
fore, throughout the experiment, abalones that were
Figure 1 Shell length (mm) of juvenile Haliotis rufescens
in two culture systems. Mean  SE. Three £ow-through
system (n 5 50150150 at each time point). Three recircu-
lating systems (n 5 50150150 at each time point).
rufescens in two culture systems. Mean  SE. Three
£ow-through system (n 5 50150150 at each time point).
Three recirculating systems (n 5 50150150 at each time
point).
in the recirculating system grew more in comparison
with the £ow-through system. Abalone growth
rates ranged from 6.43 to 58.64 (total mean
26.1) mm day  1 in the recirculating system and from
2.3 to 65.87 (total mean 22.21) mm day  1 in the £ow-
through system (Fig. 2). Juvenile survivals (at day126)
were 78.74% for organisms in the recirculation sys-
tem and 71.82% for organisms in the £ow-through
system (Fig. 3). No signi¢cant di¡erence was found
in abalone survival (F(1,4) 5 3.78, P 5 0.12).
Temperature, salinity and dissolved oxygen did not
show a signi¢cant di¡erence between treatments
(Table 1). The values of dissolved oxygen found in this
work were below the saturation point (72.54% for the
recirculating system and 71.62% for the £ow-
through system), but never below 5 mg L  1.
Although in the £ow-through system, there was
a tendency (paired samples test) to have a higher
temperature (n 5128, t 5  13.89, Po0.001), lower
NO2-N concentration (n 5 45, t 5 2.53, P 5 0.015),

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Table 1 Water quality parameters measured in two systems of culture of juvenile red abalones Haliotis rufescens

Recirculating system Flow-through system

Water parameters Mean  SE Min^Max Mean  SE Min^Max

Temperature ( 1C) 16.07  0.98 10.40–20.80 16.77  0.88 12.90–20.90

Dissolved oxygen (mg L  1) 7.08  0.51 5.34–8.50 6.89  0.55 5.23–8.28
Salinity (g L  1) 35.35  0.38 35.00–38.00 35.23  0.29 34.00–37.00
pH 8.13  0.04 7.90–8.30 8.01  0.03 7.80–8.20
Alkalinity (mg L  1) of CaCO3 139.00  7.99 100.00–165.00 115.11  4.76 95.00–140.00
TAN (mg L  1) of CaCO3 0.11  0.04 0.00–0.36 0.12  0.05 0.01–0.49
NO2-N (mg L  1) of CaCO3 0.04  0.05 0.00–0.65 0.01  0.01 0.00–0.05
NO3-N (mg L  1) of CaCO3 1.08  1.21 0.02–17.29 0.83  0.33 0.01–4.61

Temperature, dissolved oxygen, salinity and pH (n 5128). Alkalinity, TAN, nitrite-nitrogen and nitrates-nitrogen (n 5 45).

lower dissolved oxygen concentration (n 5128,
t 513.51, Po0.001) and higher salinity (n 5128,
t 5 2.45, P 5 0.016).
Alkalinity and pH were signi¢cantly di¡erent be-
tween systems (Table 1) due to the addition of sodium
bicarbonate in the recirculating system, where alkali-
nity and pH were higher (n 5 45, t 511.2, Po0.001;
n 5128, t 5 25.8, Po0.001 respectively).
There were no di¡erences between systems with
TAN (n 5 45, t 5  0.45, P 5 0.66) and NO3-N
(n 5 45, t 5 0.94, P 5 0.35) between systems (Table 1).
Discussion
Abalone growth is in£uenced by environmental con-
ditions, water quality (Leitman 1992; Hoshikawa, Sa-
kai & Kijima 1998; Harris, Maguire, Edwards & Johns
1999), diet type (Viana, Cervantes-Trujano & Solana-
Sansores 1994; Capinpin Jr & Corre 1996; Viana,
Cervantes-Trujano & Solana-Sansores 1996; Haaker,
Parker, Barsky & Chun 1998; Lopez, Tyler & Viana
1998; Bautista-Teruel & Millamena 1999; Capinpin Jr,
Toledo, Encena & Doi 1999), culture density (Day &
Fleming 1992; Mgaya & Mercer 1995; Mgaya, Gosling,
Mercer & Donlon 1995; Clarke & Creese 1998; Valdes-
Urriolagoitia 2000) and abalone size at the beginning
of the experiment (Corazani & Illanes 1998; Trevel-
yan, Mendoza & Buckley 1998; Steinarsson & Ims-
land 2003). Abalone size is a principal factor
a¡ecting the feeding rates of gastropods. Generally,
feeding rates per biomass unit are higher in smaller
and faster growing juveniles than in larger abalone
(Marsden & Williams, 1996).
H. rufescens fed with arti¢cial diets and di¡erent
types of macroalgae produce similar growth rates
as macroalgae (Table 2). It can be observed that red
abalone growth rate/initial shell length (GR/ISL)
obtained in this study were similar to other GR/ISL
values. Furthermore,Table 3 shows a comparison be-
tween studies carried out with arti¢cial diets against
macroalgae with other abalone species. The highest
growth rates in most of these works were achieved
by feeding abalones with an arti¢cial diet. This may
be explained by the fact that both the arti¢cial diets
had higher protein and fat contents and produced
the best growth rates in terms of the total weight
and shell length (Capinpin & Corre1996), which sug-
gests that diet type has a direct e¡ect on abalone
growth rate.
In contrast to this study, for other abalone species of
similar sizes growth rates of the100 mm day  1 growth
rate of similar abalone size were obtained with aba-
lone juveniles of Haliotis tuberculata (Linnaeus, 1758)
fed with an arti¢cial diet (Lopez et al. 1998) and with
Japanese abalone Haliotis discus hannai Ino,1953 (Hos-
hikawa et al. 1998) fed with diatoms. The highest
growth rates have been reported in juveniles between
10 and 40 mm shell length in other abalone species:
Haliotis asinina Linnaeus, 1758 (Capinpin & Corre,
1996; Fermin 2002), black abalone Haliotis cracherodii
Leach, 1814 (Leighton & Boolootian 1963), paua aba-
lone Haliotis iris Gmelin, 1791 (Clarke & Creese 1998),
H. fulgens (Leighton, Byhower, Kelly, Hooker & Morse
1981), greenlip abalone Haliotis laevigata Donovan,
1808 (Gilroy & Edwards 1998) and H. tuberculata (Lo-
pez et al.1998), all fed with an arti¢cial diet.
An other aspect that a¡ects the growth rate is the
culture density. For abalone cultured in £ow-through
systems, growth is inversely related to density
(Mgaya & Mercer1995; Capinpin et al.1999;Valde¤s-Ur-
riolagoitia 2000). Culture density has an inverse ef-
fect on abalone survival and may a¡ect abalone
growth directly through competition for food
and space. However, in this study, density was not a
critical factor for the growth rate because a low

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Table 2 Data from di¡erent studies on the growth juvenile red abalones Haliotis rufescens

Initial shell Growth rate

length (mm) (mm month^1) GR GR/ISL Diet Source

10.00 0.47 0.047 Macroalgae Leitman (1992)

34.51 1.23 0.036 Lessonia trabeculata Corazani and Illanes (1998)
33.70 1.67 0.049 Macadamia integifolia
34.88 0.70 0.020 Utricularia rigida
35.94 1.34 0.037 Artificial diet
8.26 1.03 0.125 Macrocystis Trevelyan et al. (1998)
8.26 1.79 0.217 Microcladia
4.00 1.13 0.283 Artificial diet Valdés-Urriolagoitia (2000)
4.00 1.00 0.250
4.00 0.58 0.145
21.00 2.97 0.141 Caminaria digitataand Palmaria Steinarsson and Imsland (2003)
palmata (9:1)
25.00 3.15 0.126
33.00 3.27 0.099
66.00 2.67 0.040
81.00 2.13 0.026
98.00 1.83 0.018
Present study
5.88 0.78 0.133 Macrocystis pyrifera Recirculating system
6.21 0.67 0.108 Flow through system

Initial shell length (ISL) is the average length of the abalone’s shell in the beginning of the experiment and growth rate (GR) is the
monthly growth of the abalones shell (evaluated in millimetres).

Table 3 Data of di¡erent relating experimental studies for the growth juvenile of diverse species

Initial shell Growth rate

Species length (mm) (mm month^1) GR/ISL Diet Source

Haliotis fulgens 10.00 2.71 0.271 Egregia laevigata and Leighton et al. (1981)
25.00 1.74 0.070 Macrocystis pyrifera
42.00 0.71 0.017
Haliotis tuberculata 15.30 1.75 0.114 Palmaria palmata Mgaya and Mercer (1995)
15.20 1.07 0.070
19.60 1.61 0.082
23.80 1.67 0.070
16.80 1.81 0.108
Haliotis asinina 15.80 4.07 0.258 Gracilaria bailinae Bautista-Teruel and Millamena (1999)
15.20 6.67 0.439 Artificial diet
15.80 7.33 0.464 Artificial diet
15.90 7.43 0.467 Artificial diet
Haliotis asinina 19.00 4.20 0.221 Gracilaria heteroclada Capinpin et al. (1999)
Haliotis rubra 33.91 1.30 0.038 Artificial diet Huchette et al. (2003)
34.23 0.90
Present study
Haliotis rufescens 5.88 0.78 0.133 Macrocystis pyrifera Recirculating system
6.21 0.67 0.108 Flow through system

Initial shell length (ISL) is the average length of the abalone’s shell in the beginning of the experiment and growth rate (GR) is the
monthly growth of the abalones shell (evaluated in millimetres).

stocking density was used for both culture systems to
eliminate potential complications due to a high stock-
ing rate. The low stocking density used in this study
can explain the highest survival rate obtained com-
pared with the survival rates reported in other stu-
dies (Nie, Ji & Yan 1996, Park, Rho & Song 1995).
Also, the di¡erences may be due to the size of the or-
ganisms and the duration of the experiment. There-
fore, it is possible to obtain high growth rates of H.
rufescens even on feeding with macroalgae if the phy-
sical^chemical variables are within the ranges of
good water quality and low stocking density.

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Mortality not only depends on the culture density
but also on inadequate handling (stress) of food
transfer (Searcy-Bernal, Salas-Garza & Flores-Agui-
lar 1992). The mortality rate is also associated with
the organism’s size and stage of development (Ma-
zo¤n-SuaŁstegui et al.1996).Water quality variables like
salinity, temperature, dissolved oxygen, pH and ni-
trogen wastes are also important factors governing
the growth of abalones (Harris, Maguire, Edwards &
Hindrum 1998). The results obtained in the present
work for all physical^chemical variables are within
the ranges of good water quality.
Special attention should be paid to the pH and al-
kalinity variables, because they were the only two
quality parameters that di¡ered considerably be-
tween the £ow-through and the recirculating system
due to the addition of sodium bicarbonate to the re-
circulating system. However, the pH range observed
in the recirculating system was similar to those
shown in other studies with di¡erent abalone species
(Nie et al.1996; Harris, Maguire, Edwards & Hindrum
1997; Harris et al. 1998; Basuyaux & Mathieu 1999;
Bautista-Teruel & Millamena 1999). The pH interval
obtained in this study is within the pH values that
promoted the activities of nitrifying bacteria and pre-
vents ammonia toxicity (Loyless & Malone 1997, Mal-
one & Beecher 2000). To our knowledge, there are no
studies on the in£uence of alkalinity on abalone me-
tabolism; however, the alkalinity values in the recir-
culating system (100^165 mg L  1 CaCO3) were
within the ranges recommended for bacterial survi-
val in bio¢lters (Masser et al. 1992; Loyless & Malone
1997; Malone & Beecher 2000). Further studies on
the e¡ect of alkalinity on abalone growth could be
carried out; however, it is considered that low alkali-
nity and pH values may have a higher e¡ect on aba-
lone growth than alkalinity values between 100 and
165 L  1 CaCO3, because these values were close to
the alkalinity values found in the £ow-through sys-
tem and in nature.
In the case of the waste nitrogen compounds, the
TAN, NO2-N and NO3-N concentrations presented in
this study are below the toxic levels reported for aba-
lone (Harris et al. 1997; Harris et al. 1998). Basuyaux
and Mathieu (1999) found that H. laevigata mortality
and growth were a¡ected by a concentration of
1mg TAN L  1; they also found that a concentration
of 1^5 mg NO2-N L  1 does not in£uence abalone
growth, and in contrast, a concentration of
2 mg NO2-N L  1 stimulates the growth in H. tubercu-
lata. On the other hand, they report that toxic levels
are from 8.5 to 15.4 NO2-N L  1. For the NO3-N,
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Aquaculture Research, 2011, 42, 161^168
Table 4 Cost analysis of the two systems of culture of juve-
nile red abalones Haliotis rufescens
Cost (US$)
Recirculating Flow-through
system system
Equipment cost
Bubble wash bead filter 571.67
Fibreglass tank 154.30 154.30
PVC pipes 30.86 30.86
Magdrive 500 pump 51.02
Electric energy
Pumping cost (per day) 0.09 1.76
Pumping total cost (127 days) 11.43 223.52
Total 819.28 408.68
Difference between systems 410.60
Costs calculated by tank in the experiment time. The cost of
water pumped from the ocean and the equipment associated
was not considered.
Basuyaux and Mathieu (1999) reported that H. tuber-
culata supports (without a¡ecting growth) a concen-
tration range of 100^250 mg of NO3-N L  1. The low
concentration of the waste nitrogen compounds
(TAN, NO2-N and NO3-N) presented in this study was
probably due to the low density of abalones used and
had no e¡ect on abalone growth.
In the £ow-through system, nearly 15^30% of the
production costs are associated with the mainte-
nance of a high rate of exchange. One way to de-
crease the cost of production associated with
constantly pumping water through the abalone
grow-out tanks can be with the use of recirculating
systems (Badillo, Segovia & Searcy-Bernal 2007). For
a recirculating system to be considered a closed sys-
tem, it should have o10% of water exchange per day
of the total volume of the system (Masser et al. 1992;
Loyless & Malone 1997). In our experiment, the water
exchange was 4.8% of the total volume per day and
the only water replaced was that lost by evaporation
and bio¢lter back£ushes; thus, it can be considered as
a closed system.
Table 4 shows a cost analysis of the two culture
systems used in this study. In the recirculating sys-
tem, the high initial costs are due to the equipment
purchased (bead ¢lter). However, with the saving of
the rate of water exchange in the recirculating sys-
tems, it is possible to recover the initial investment
in a short period of time. In this case, the investment
recovery time is close to 8 months.
An economic analysis to the commercial level is
necessary and will be important for the choice of the
optimum stocking density to maximize the produc-
r 2010 CICESE
Aquaculture Research, 2011, 42, 161^168 Recirculating and £ow through red abalone culture M.Vivanco-Aranda et al.
tion of H. rufescens in recirculation culture systems.
With the present work, it is possible to state that recir-
culating systems are a feasible alternative for the
culture of juvenile red abalone at a low density.
Acknowledgments
The CONACYT supported the M.Sc. studies of M.V.-A.
with a scholarship. This study was partially ¢nanced
by means of the CONACYT project ‘Genetic markers
of abalone, Haliotis spp.’ (33018 B) and by CICESE pro-
ject number 655. The authors are particularly grate-
ful to the commercial farm ‘Abulones Cultivados S.A.
de C.V.’ for providing the abalone used in this research.
The authors also thank Marisela Aguilar-JuaŁrez for
the support provided and Oscar B. Del R|¤ o Zaragoza
for the technical assistance.
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