Physiological correlates of growth and condition in the yellow perch (Perca flavescens)

This study on yellow perch (Perca flavescens) examines a series of enzymatic markers and the relative weights of pyloric caeca and visceral lipids, their response to changes in feeding regime and their potential use to infer recent changes in growth rate and fish condition. Fish were exposed to four different feeding regimes for 12 weeks resulting in specific growth rates ranging from 0.3% to 3.5% (%/day). Growth and condition responded rapidly to changes in ration and the weight of pyloric caeca and visceral lipids reflected increased feed intake. Growth rate was correlated with muscle citrate synthase and caecal nucleoside-diphosphate kinase activities, whereas condition was correlated with muscle citrate synthase and lactate dehydrogenase activities and with caecal glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase activity. Results showed that enzyme activities and biometric parameters responded rapidly to increased feed intake, but the response was slower when food intake decreased. Plateaus were attained for both condition and visceral lipid index, but the relative weight of pyloric caeca continued to increase throughout the experimental period. Results from this study could, in principle, be used to infer recent growth and energy status in wild yellow perch and thus provide an indicator of food availability in their environment.