The 1966 and 1967 diet trials at the Salmon-Cultural Laboratory indicated that fall chinook salmon fingerlings utilized an all-meal diet more efficiently when pelleted than when ricer feed. The Abernathy pellet was comparable to the Oregon pellet. Supplement vitamins C and E proved to be required under certain conditions of the experiment while vitamins K, para-aminobenzoic acid, B12, cod liver oil, and a mineral mixture were not shown to be of benefit.

The 1970 fall chinook salmon feeding trials indicated that dry pelleted diets were equal to moist pelleted diets with similar formulations. A superior diet was produced by reducing the ratio of dried whey product and wheat germ meal to 1:1 and eliminating cottonseed meal. This formulation feed at a 45-percent protein level was more efficient than other protein levels fed. Growth was not reduced when the soybean oil supplement was lowered from 6 to 2 percent of the diet. Two corn distillers' products that were substituted as partial replacements for dried whey product did not enhance fish growth. Storage of the Abernathy dry pellet at room temperature did not alter the nutritional adequacy of the diet.

Feeding trials using fall chinook salmon finglerlings were conducted at the Salmon Cultural Laboratory, Longview, Washington, during 1971 for the purpose of improving the Abernathy diet formula. The results indicated that cottonseed meal could replace a portion of the fish meal in the diet without reducing fish growth, but similar substitutions of wheat and corn gluten meal reduced growth. Fish growth was significantly increased when a diet containing 50 percent protein and 3,350 kcal per kilogram was fed as compared with a diet containing 45 percent protein and 3,350 kcal per kilogram. Soybean lecithin proved to be equal to soybean oil as a caloric source when fed at 2 percent of the diet. Two types of dried whey product with different levels of lactose content produced similar growth response. Reducing the dried whey portion of the diet to 5 percent did not affect growth, nor did methionine supplementation produce any effects. Anchovy meal was unsuitable as a replacement for herring meal.

Studies on two hemoflagellates of fish were carried out to determine biological parameters: host range, vector relations, in vivo culture, in vitro culture, pathogenicit, and cryogenic preservation.

This handbook is intended as a general list of procedures and subprocedures used by the Fish Pesticide Research Laboratory in the processing of fish and other aquatic samples for pesticide residue analysis.

Striped bass from the Apalachicola and St. Johns Rivers in Florida were compared taxonomically with striped bass from other drainages on the Atlantic coast and Gulf of Mexico. Both rivers contain endemic striped bass populations. The Apalachicola River population was found to be a separate race. Sexually mature striped bass from the St. Johns were induced to spawn using hormonal injections. Few fry were produced due to extreme temperature fluctuations. Reproduction requirements and factors limiting the abundance of striped bass in Florida are discussed.