Effect of Feed Cycling on Specific Growth Rate, Condition Factor, Body Composition And Rna/Dna Ratio Of Cirrhinus mrigala.

Abstract

A randomly selected 60 samples of Cirrhinus mrigala, fingerling sized, were collected from Qadria fish hatchery and farm, Matital road, Multan. Fish were divided into three groups namely, control, 5 and 10 days cyclic feeding group. Specific growth rate (% g day-1 ), condition factor (K), body composition and RNA/DNA ratio of individual specimen and of each group were calculated. It was found that there was highly significant effect of feed cycling on specific growth rate (P<0.001) and significant effect (0.01) on condition factor of Cirrhinus mrigala. There was a sharp decline in specific growth rate with increase in length of starvation but carp was able to maintain its body constituents i.e., % water, % dry body mass, % ash, % fat, % protein and % organic contents (P>0.05) suggesting a compensatory growth which was independent of length of starvation. Feed cycling had marked effect (P<0.05) on RNA/DNA ratio of this carp and a gradual decrease in RNA/DNA ratio was observed with increase in length of starvation. @JASEM