Abstract
Fish protein is serving as a source of nutrition for protein starving world. However, sustainable aquaculture products require inexpensive plant by-products due to finite sources of fish meal. Therefore, this study was conducted to examine nutrient utilization, growth performance and hematological indices of Cirrhinus mrigala fingerlings fed on Moringa oleifera leaf meal (MOLM) based diets. Fish were fed with six isonitrogenous and isoenergetic diets having MOLM as a substitute of fish meal (FM) at the levels of 0%, 10%, 20%, 30%, 40% and 50% for the period of 90 days. Fingerlings having initial weight 6.35±0.04g were reared in triplicate tanks at the stocking density of 15 and hand fed at the rate of 5% of total biomass twice regularly. Chromic oxide inclusion level was 1% in diets. After analysis, maximum growth performance and improved digestibility of nutrients were found in fish fed with diet at 10% replacement level as compared to fish fed on control diet and other test diets. Additionally, it was found that the red blood cells, white blood cells, hemoglobin and mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration of fish showed a significantly (p<0.05) inverse correlation with the increase in MOLM. In present research, it was concluded that MOLM has good potential to be used as a FM substitute in C. mrigala diet with maximum effect at 10% showing positive hematological indices.
Highlights
Global demand for foods in relation to aquatic origin has maximized because of the exponential increase in population growth, and due to a variety of nutritious foods for humans (Naseem et al, 2020)
Apparent nutrient digestibility After 90 days of feeding trial, it was clear that minimum amount of nutrients was discharged through feces in water at 10% Moringa oleifera leaf meal (MOLM) followed by 20% replacement level (Table 3)
The nutrient utilization and growth performance of fish was first increased up to 10% level, while later on decreased as MOLM inclusion levels increased in diets
Summary
Global demand for foods in relation to aquatic origin has maximized because of the exponential increase in population growth, and due to a variety of nutritious foods for humans (Naseem et al, 2020). It is estimated that the world’s population will reach 9.7 billion by the year 2050 and will heighten the supply of food by. A significant quantity of FM contains a wide range of amino acids profile, which is the reason rendering it costly aqua feed ingredient. This has made it difficult for aqua-culturists to access fish meal for fish feed. The use of plant-based protein sources is being considered necessary for fish culture sector that can be totally or partially replaced fish meal in diets for fresh water fishes (Wang et al, 2016)
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