In front of the rapid world-wide expansion of aquaculture, and the rarefaction of the natural resources, to find alternative sources of protein, ecologically and economically friendly for fish feeding became unavoidable. By their nutritional qualities, and because they are part of the aquatic food web, microalgae are targeted as an attractive route to meet this challenge. Among them, Spirulina (Arthrospira platensis) showed a good potential with high protein content, and digestibility, and lack of anti-nutritional factor. It is also relatively easy to produce, industrially, or handmade by farmers themselves, especially in the tropics. Preliminary results obtained on Sarotherodon melanotheron eudelottii, Showed that 2.6g juveniles had a good acceptance of pellets composed with 100% dried spirulina, after a six days adaptation phase, and survived for seven months, without any mortality on such a feed. It suggested the possibility to farm this species with dried spirulina as sole source of food, although a light decrease of growth was observed, compared to commercial diet (-17.6%).The objective of the present study was to investigate if this tilapia species could be fed on such a diet from the very first larval stage. Spirulina production was done in photobioreactor by a reproducible protocol developed in our laboratory. Fresh biomass was harvested using a separation membrane technology, and stabilization performed by dehydration and transformation to thin particles similar to industrial food. Palatability and acceptation of spirulina by larvae and fry was tested from the first feeding to one month-old at 28°C.The result showed a good acceptance the spirulina diet by the fish, inducing neither mortality nor body deformity. The Spirulina groups grew less (-75%) than the control groups but their proximal composition revealed a higher content in protein (+17%) and in ¿-6 (+9%) while less ¿-3 (-15%). (Texte intégral)