LAUSR

Silver pomfret (Pampus argenteus) is one of the most important fishery products in the Indo-Pacific Ocean. However, little is known about the genetic parameters of economic traits. To determine whether the selective breeding program would improve economic traits, we evaluated the growth performance of the selected group and the control group at 60, 90, and 120 days, and the growth performance parameters of the selected group were higher than those of the control group. Through Pearson correlation analysis, it was found that the morphological traits that are highly related to the weight of P. argenteus are body length and body height. Genetic gain and realized heritability for body weight were highest at day 90, which were 12.72% and 0.23, respectively. Therefore, we speculate that the day 90 may be a critical time for screening. The average coefficient of variation for body weight reached over 30%. All three morphological traits reached moderate realized heritability at days 90 after hatching. These implied that selective breeding has the potential to improve the growth traits of P. argenteus. In addition, the reproductive performance of P. argenteus parent fish was obviously improved after gonadal strengthening. These results provide important information for future breeding programmes for P. argenteus. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.