Journal of Aquaculture Research & Development

Abstract

Aquatic Weed as Potential Feed for Mozambique tilapia, Oreochromis mossambicus

Mukti Pada Bag, Subhash Chandra Mahapatra and Pavuluri Srinivasa Rao

A study was conducted to evaluate the nutritional potentials of three commonly available aquatic weeds namely, lemna (Lemna minor), water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes) and azolla (Azolla pinnata) for ascertaining their suitability in fish feed with the aim of reducing the cost of traditional feeds. Three isonitrogenous (30% crude protein approximately) and isocaloric (4.0 kcal g−1 approximately) diets were formulated including lemna, water hyacinth and azolla as principal ingredient. Three groups of juvenile tilapia fish (Oreochromis mossambicus) of thirty (30) number per group (Average weight 5.1 ± 0.15 g; length 4.5 ± 0.12 cm) were fed with three different types of feeds with lemna meal (LNM), water hyacinth meal (WHM) and azolla meal (AZM) for 90 days duration. Body weight gain, feed conversion ratio (FCR), protein efficiency ratio (PER) and gonadosomatic index (GSI) were significantly (P<0.05) high in LNM fed fish in comparison to the others. The lemna possibly contains superior quality of protein which in turn influenced growth, growth parameters and fecundity of cultured fish.