Title : Effect of garlic and ginger mixture on growth and improvement of physiological condition of African catfish juveniles raised in closed system
Abstract:
An 84-day study was conducted to evaluate the growth performance, feed nutrient utilisation and retention, whole body composition, orgonosomatic indices and blood serum biochemical profile of juvenile Clarias gariepinus fed diets supplemented with garlic-ginger mixture. Four isoproteinic diets were prepared with varying levels of garlic-ginger mixture at 0%, 1%, 2% and 3% corresponding to treatments D0 (control), D1, D2, and D3. A total of 120 juveniles (46.55±3.66g) were randomly distributed in triplicate to 12 plastic tanks and fed three times daily (09:00, 13:00, and 17:00) at the feeding rate of 5-3% of the biomass with biweekly intermediate sampling for biometric measurements and total counting. Water temperature, pH, dissolved oxygen, ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate measured daily before feeding were found to be within the accepted levels for raising C. gariepinus. At the end of the experiment, 18 mixed-sex adult fish were randomly selected from each treatment group. Six of them were sacrificed for final whole-body bromatological composition. For the remaining 12, blood obtained through the caudal fin was collected in non-heparinised tubes and left in the open air for 5 hours. Afterwards, the serum samples were transferred to other tubes and stored at -20°C for biochemical analysis. Results indicate that fish in treatment D2 have expressed the best performances in terms of weight gain (WG=175.38±3.05g), protein efficiency ratio (PER=1.39±0.05), lipid efficiency ratio (LER=12.92±0.38), and feed conversion ratio (FCR=1.55±0.05) significantly different from 44.96%, 34.53%, 51.31% and 37%, respectively, relative to control (WG=99.53±0.03g, PE=0.91±0.07, LE=6.29±0.45, and FCR=2.46±0.18). In addition, diets containing the garlic-ginger mixture significantly improved whole-body bromatology, nutrient retention, organosomatic indices, and serum biochemical profile compared to control. In general, the best values were obtained in treatment D2 with a significantly high retention of ash (24.63 1.04% dry feed), protein (33.48 0.39% dry feed), lipids (68.63 2.81% dry feed), and energy (25.56 0.04% dry feed) by 50,38%, 45%, 66.72% and 44.56% respectively, compared to control. The same observations were made for total serum proteins, total cholesterol, HDL-Cholesterol and LDL-Cholesterol, with a significantly higher HDL-C/LDL-C (2.60 0.01) ratio of 33.10% compared to control (HDL-C/LDL-C=1.74 0.05). The observed growth enhancement could be the result of the bioactive components of garlic and ginger acting in synergy to improve gastrointestinal tract organ function, nutrient metabolism, and overall health. Thus, African catfish production can be enhanced by adding garlic and ginger to feed.
KEYWORDS: Clarias gariepinus, Garlic, Ginger, Growth, body nutrient content and blood serum profile