Currently, the control of reproduction in the commercial culture of Litopenaeus vannamei is carried out by ablation of the ocular peduncle, however, this endocrine manipulation presents a series of problems associated with the production of postlarvae and the survival of the broodstock. For this reason, the search for alternatives that can replace or complement the use of this technique has gained interest, with the use of pheromones being one of the alternatives with the greatest potential.
However, the investigation of these molecules in crustaceans has received little attention despite of their the potential uses in the field of aquaculture, and although in L. vannamei the existence of two types of female pheromones (distance and contact) is hypothesized, to date these have not been identified and there is no bioassay protocol for their identification. Therefore, to establish the bases for future investigations that allow pheromones to become a feasible alternative or complement to ablation, the objective of this work was to standardize a bioassay protocol for the identification of female contact pheromones in L. vannamei.
To this end, the effect of (1) light during acclimation, (2) acclimation time and (3) “artificial female” material on male shrimp behaviour was evaluated. Subsequently, different methods of introducing the “artificial female” coated with liposoluble molecules extracted from the cuticle of mature females on the reproductive behaviour of male shrimp was evaluated. All results (Figures 1, 2, 3 and 4) were analyzed using the Bartlett’s exact test, concluding that the following conditions are needed for a clear evidence of the potential effect that female contact sex pheromones can have on the reproductive behaviour of male shrimp: 1) a conditioning period of at least 1 h with the tank covered; 2) an introduction of the “artificial female” made of rigid PVC tubes coated with liposoluble molecules while the tank is still covered; and 3) an observation period of at least 20 min.