WATER QUALITY ASSESSMENT AND DIETARY HABITS OF ALESTES NURSE IN GUBI DAM BAUCHI STATE

Mohammed Abdulkarim, L S Lamai

Abstract


The study was conducted to determine water quality, stomach content and the dietary requirements of Alestes nurse caught in Gubi Dam, Bauchi. pH obtained in the dam was slightly acidic (6.8) in August, 2007 to moderately alkaline (9.0) in September, 2007 and January, 2008. The dam water had Ammonia (NH) that range from 0.0 – 12.50, Nitrite (NO2) range from 0.0 – 0.1 and Nitrate (NO33) range from 0.0 – 12.50. Majority (61%) of A. nurse obtained in dry season had empty stomach while few (7%) in wet season. Relative Importance Index was adapted for stomach content analysis of the fish in both dry and wet seasons. Stomach repletion was indicated as 0 for empty, 1, 2 and 3 for 25%, 50 – 75% and 75 – 100% of the volume respectively. Point method was used to ascribe points to stomach content based on stomach weight (SW) of specimens caught in a previous collection. Majority (61%) of A. nurse obtained in dry season had empty stomach while few (7%) in wet season. Relative importance index (AI) and frequency of food item obtained in wet and dry seasons showed that in wet season A. nurse preferred insect parts (AI=600 and F= 51), leaf parts (AI=484 and F= 44) and fish parts (AI=336 and F= 34) respectively, while in dry season both insect parts and detritus had the same value of food items encountered (AI = 80 and F = 16), suggesting that the fish fed on broad spectrum of food items. Commercial feed manufacturer should be encouraged to formulate a diet for A. nurse based on dietary habit of the fish in order to promote its aquaculture production.


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