Axler, Richard PSchuldt, JTikkanen, Craig AMcDonald, Michael EHenneck, Jerald2015-03-032017-04-142015-03-032017-04-141995https://hdl.handle.net/11299/187242Fish culture has great potential in Minnesota but the potential for water quality impacts has slowed its development. Since 1989 we have been developing an aquacultural effluent model (FIS-C) for assessing the actual and potential impacts of Chinook salmon waste loads. FIS-C is a based on a bioenergetics model where growth = (consumption - waste losses - respiration losses), where waste losses are egestion and excretion, and metabolic costs are incorporated into respiration losses. The model provides a novel way of estimating the magnitude and seasonality of discharges, because it can discriminate among waste fractions, and also has excellent potential for predicting the effects of different waste collection strategies. The model has already proven to be a robust estimator of consumption, when fish growth is known, for a variety of wild species and for net-pen cultured Chinook salmon. Maximum utility for Minnesota's industry requires expanding its library of physiological parameters to other species and culture systems, and then verifying its predictions in the field. Although FIS-C would be applicable to recirculating systems, land-based flow-through facilities, with short detention times and minimal "in-water" transformations such as solubilization, sedimentation, mineralization and nitrification, provide the best opportunity to accurately verify its predictions. The present study developed the model for rainbow trout, an economically important species in Minnesota, assessed its accuracy for two different successful, commercial trout farms, and initiated the development of an extension bulletin for disseminating our results to the industry.enFish simulation culture model (FIS-C)BioenergeticsAquacultureRainbow troutWaste loadsNatural Resources Research InstituteUniversity of Minnesota DuluthTechnical Report