On-farm evaluation of formulated feeds on the breeding performance of Catla catla reared in rural ponds

Abstract

Female Catla catla brood fish were reared in 12 ponds (0.03-0.05 ha) and fed daily once in the morning at 30 g kg⁻¹ body weight for 150 days with formulated feeds (six treatment feeds each with two replicates of pond) to study the breeding performances. The feed ingredients were rice polish (RP) and groundnut oil cake (GNOC) (1 : 1) for T1 (control); RP, GNOC and fish meal (FM) (3 : 4 : 3) for T2; RP, GNOC, FM and soybean meal (SM) (3 : 4 : 2 : 1) for T3; RP, GNOC, FM and SM (3 : 4 : 1: 2) for T4; RP, GNOC, FM and SM (3 : 4 : 1 : 2) with added vitamin-mineral (VM) premix for T5; RP, GNOC, FM and SM (3 : 4 : 1 : 2) with added VM and vegetable oil for T6. Results indicated that except the feed T6, all other feed (T2-T5) with 338-344 g crude protein (CP) kg⁻¹ feed enhanced the breeding performances of the fish compared with control (262 g CP kg⁻¹). The feed T3 showed the best performances in terms of matured female (%), fully bred female (%), relative fecundity, spawn production and profit. This suggests that a combination of RP, GNOC, FM and SM at definite proportion could supply the essential nutrients needed for higher breeding response.