Skip to main content May 2012, Volume 35, Issue 5, pp 717–724Proximate composition and energy density of nototheniid and myctophid fish in McMurdo Sound and the Ross Sea, AntarcticaFirst Online: 11 November 2011Received: 18 August 2011Revised: 25 September 2011Accepted: 11 October 2011DOI: 10.1007/s00300-011-1116-9Cite this article as: Lenky, C., Eisert, R., Oftedal, O.T. et al. Polar Biol (2012) 35: 717. doi:10.1007/s00300-011-1116-9AbstractNototheniid and myctophid fish are primary prey for marine piscivores, yet little is known about their nutritional value. In this study, we characterized the proximate composition [PC: water, fat (neutral lipids), crude protein (CP) and ash] and energy density (ED; kJ g−1) of fifteen fish species from McMurdo Sound and the Ross Sea, Antarctica. We assayed the entire fish for all species except for the large Antarctic toothfish, Dissostichus mawsoni (muscle tissue only). On a wet mass basis (WM), fish were variable in composition: moisture content ranged from 64.9 to 87.3% WM, fat from 0.5 to 17.4% WM, CP from 7.7 to 16.7% WM, ash from 11.2 to 21.0% FFDM (fat-free dry mass), and ED from 2.9 to 10.3 kJ g−1.