eggs To determine the female reproductive performance mating of the broodstock was performed from the 115th day, according to methodology described by Macintosch and Little (1995), in which two males per treatment were transferred to the tanks of females that were receiving the same diet. The mating period lasted five days at a proportion of three females to one male. The tanks that housed the females were considered an experimental unit according to the methodology described by El-Sayed et al. (2005) At the end of the mating season assessment of the oral cavity of females was conducted when egg masses were collected from 25 females/treatment, by counter flow in the oropharyngeal cavity with the aid of a wash bottle containing water and a 500 mL beaker. To evaluate the females’ reproductive index at the time of collection, the removed eggs were weighed on a digital precision balance (0.001 g), and 3 g of collected sample were fixed in 4% formalin solution and subsequently counted, to estimate relative fecundity(number of eggs per gram of female body weight) and absolute fecundity (total number of eggs per spawning),as adapted from El-Sayed et al. (2005).