Apparent digestibility coefficient of chickpea, maize, high-quality protein maize, and beans diets in juvenile and adult Nile tilapia ( Oreochromis niloticus )

Magnolia Montoya-Mejía,Héctor Nolasco-Soria,Alfredo Hernández-Llamas,Roberto Gutierrez-Dorado,Hervey Rodríguez-González,Manuel García-Ulloa

doi:10.1590/s1806-92902016000800001

Abstract

The objective of our study was to assess the apparent digestibility of plant ingredients in diets for juvenile (50 g) and adult (220 g) Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus). Dietary dry matter and protein apparent digestibility coefficients of four plant-derived feedstuffs (chickpea, maize, high-quality maize protein, and beans) were tested. The beans diet had the lowest apparent digestibility coefficient of dry matter (ADCDM) (69.41%), while no significant differences were detected in ADCDM among the other diets; ADCDM was significantly higher in adults compared with juveniles (77.02 vs. 73.76%). Apparent dry matter digestibility coefficient of ingredients (ADCI) was significantly higher in the chickpea (70.48%) and high-quality protein maize (71.09%) ingredients, and lower in the beans (52.79%) ingredient. Apparent dry matter digestibility coefficient of ingredients was significantly higher in juveniles compared with adults (72.56 vs. 56.80%). The protein digestibility of diet (ADCCP) was significantly higher in the reference diet (93.68%), while the lowest corresponded to the maize (87.86%) and beans (87.29%) diets. Significantly lower apparent digestibility coefficient of protein (ADCICP ) was obtained with the high-quality maize protein (59.11%) and maize (49.48%) ingredients, while higher ADCICP was obtained with the chickpea and beans ingredients (71.31 and 63.89%, respectively). The apparent digestibility coefficient of ingredient crude protein ADCICP was significantly higher in juveniles compared with adults (67.35 vs. 53.46). Digestibility is generally higher in juveniles, and we recommend using chickpea as an ingredient in diets for Nile tilapia.

Highlights

Diets for fish are usually formulated with different animal and plant ingredients
The beans diet had the lowest apparent digestibility coefficient of dry matter (ADCDM) (69.41%), while no significant differences were detected in ADCDM among the other diets; ADCDM was significantly higher in adults compared with juveniles (77.02 vs. 73.76%)
Apparent digestibility coefficients of dry matter varied from 71.32% to 74.86% in juveniles, and from 67.5% to 85.37% in adults

Summary

Introduction

Animal-derived ingredients are mainly used to satisfy protein requirements, of carnivorous species. These ingredients are generally more expensive, scarce, and less available than ingredients of plant origin (Chamberlain, 1995). Various protein sources, such as coffee pulp (Ulloa Rojas and Verreth, 2003), leucaena leaf meal (Wee and Wang, 1987), cottonseed meal (Lee and Dabrowski, 2002), moringa (Richter et al, 2003), and torula yeast (Olvera-Novoa et al, 2002) have been studied as ingredients in diets for tilapia. Chickpea, and beans are highly available low-cost products in the international market. In his review on the use of plant protein sources in fish diets, Hardy (2010) stressed that, despite the rapid increases in prices of plant meals, the cost per unit protein for plant protein sources remained lower than that of fishmeal protein

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