Effects of different substrate environments on growth, shell color and antioxidant capacity of Babylonia areolata juveniles

To optimize the healthy culture technology of Babylonia areolata, we compared and analyzed its growth, shell color and antioxidant properties under five substrate environments (River sand, brown ceramsite, black ceramsite, yellow ceramsite, white ceramsite). The results indicat that the ammonia nitrogen content in the river sand group (0.382±0.010) mg·L⁻¹ was significantly higher than that in the other groups (P<0.05). The highest survival rate was observed in brown ceramide group (62.00±2.00)%, which was significantly higher than that of river sand group (56.00±1.00)%, yellow ceramides group (48.00±2.00)% and white ceramides group (42.50±3.00)% (P<0.05). The shell height, shell width and body mass in river sand group were significantly higher than those in black, yellow and white ceramides groups (P<0.05). At the end of the experiment, the values of lightness, redness and yellowness of shell color in brown ceramide group were significantly higher than those in the other groups (P<0.05). The total antioxidant capacity (T-AOC) in brown ceramide group was significantly higher than that in the other groups (P<0.05). However, the catalase (CAT) activity and malonaldehyde (MDA) content were lower than those in the other groups, with (12.614±0.378) U·mg⁻¹ and (1.179±0.001) nmol·mg⁻¹, respectively. In conclusion, substrate environment can significantly affect the growth, shell color, and antioxidant performance of juvenile B. areolate, and brown ceramide can be selected to replace river sand as the substrate in its farming.