Do Dietary Synbiotics Modulate Growth Performance and Haematological Properties of Tilapia, Oreochromis niloticus ?

Abstract

A 60-day long aquarium trial was conducted in laboratory condition to assess the growth performance of tilapia Oreochromis niloticus fed with various types of synbiotic diets. Twenty-five homogenous fry were randomly assigned into four different treatments with three replications. Fish were fed with experimental diets containing 0.3% probiotic (PBO)+1.5% molasses, 0.3% PBO+1.5% yeast and 0.3% PBO+1.5% sugar and marked as T1 T4 (control), T2, T3 and T4 and fish in control were feed with commercial diet. Length and weight were recorded every 10 days and at the end of the trial blood samples were extracted for haematological analysis. The T4 group showed significantly higher growth performance among the treatments and differences between T1 and T2 were found as non-significant (P<0.05). Again, significantly superior Specific Growth Rate (SGR %) was found in T4 and non-significant differences detected between T2 and T3 as well (P>0.05). Haematological analysis showed significant changes among the treatments for hemoglobin, Red Blood Cell (RBC) count and White Blood Cell (WBC) count (P>0.05). All treatments showed better growth performance in contrast to the control group. Finally, present results indicate that synbiotics might increase the growth performances, haematological indices and health condition in O. niloticus.