Effects of dietary lipid levels on growth performance, hepatic health, lipid metabolism and intestinal microbiota on Trachinotus ovatus

Proper dietary lipid is beneficial for the protein‐sparing effect and reduces feed budget. Therefore, 8 weeks trial feeding with different lipid levels diets was performed to determine the optimal supplement level through the investigation on growth performance, hepatic health, lipid metabolism and intestinal microbiota of Trachinotus ovatus. Six diets (D1 ‐ D6) containing 90 g/kg, 120 g/kg, 150 g/kg, 180 g/kg, 210 g/kg and 240 g/kg lipid were formulated, respectively. Each diet was randomly assigned to four groups of fish (initial body weight 7.58 ± 0.10 g), and fish was fed twice daily to apparent satiation. Results showed that the weight gain and the specific growth rate of T. ovatus fed with D2 diet were significantly higher than the D1, D5 and D6 treatments (p