The effect of diets suplemented with different natural foods on growth and feed utilization of snakehead (Channa striata)

Abstract

A sixty day feeding study was performed to determine the impact of diets enriched with various natural foods on growth and feed utilization of snakehead. Six hundred fingerlings weighing 4.33 to 4.71 g each fish were randomly stocked into 4 triplicate plastic tanks (1x1x1.5 m), fifty fish each tank. Four isoproteic and isoenergetic diets containing 45% crude protein and 18.5 KJ g-1gross energy were formulated. Control diet was formulated using fishmeal, salted trash fish, tofu by-product meal, rice bran, vitamin and mineral mix. The three diets were prepared with the same ingredients as control diet but were supplemented with 15% fresh earth worm (W), golden snail (S) and frog (F), respectively. The diets were fed to the fish at 6% body weight, twice daily for 60 days. Feeding the fish with diet F and S did not influence fish survival rate, weight gain, specific growth rate, feed intake, feed efficiency ratio, protein efficiency ratio and protein retention. However, feeding the fish with diet W increased weight gain and feed intake. It can be concluded that the supplementation of snakehead diet with fresh worm can improve growth performance and feed intake by the fish.

Full text

The effect of diets suplemented with different
natural foods on growth and feed utilization of
snakehead (Channa striata)
Bustari Hasan1
*
, Dian Iriani1, Trisla Warningsih1 and Christopher Marlowe A. Caipang2,
Indra Suharman1
1Faculty of Fisheries and Marine Sciences, Universitas Riau, Pekanbaru 28292, Indonesia
2Division of Biological Sciences, College of Arts and Sciences, University of the Philippines Visayas,
Miag-ao, Iloilo 5023, Philippines
Abstract. A sixty day feeding study was performed to determine the impact
of diets enriched with various natural foods on growth and feed utilization
of snakehead. Six hundred fingerlings weighing 4.33 to 4.71 g each fish were
randomly stocked into 4 triplicate plastic tanks (1x1x1.5 m), fifty fish each
tank. Four isoproteic and isoenergetic diets containing 45% crude protein
and 18.5 KJ g-1gross energy were formulated. Control diet was formulated
using fishmeal, salted trash fish, tofu by-product meal, rice bran, vitamin
and mineral mix. The three diets were prepared with the same ingredients as
control diet but were supplemented with 15% fresh earth worm (W), golden
snail (S) and frog (F), respectively. The diets were fed to the fish at 6% body
weight, twice daily for 60 days. Feeding the fish with diet F and S did not
influence fish survival rate, weight gain, specific growth rate, feed intake,
feed efficiency ratio, protein efficiency ratio and protein retention. However,
feeding the fish with diet W increased weight gain and feed intake. It can be
concluded that the supplementation of snakehead diet with fresh worm can
improve growth performance and feed intake by the fish.
1 Introduction
Snakehead (Channa striatus, Bloch, 1793) is a freshwater food fish, which are usually
found in streams , lakes, oxbow, , rice fields, agricultural canal, swamps and marshes [1,2,
3, 4]. It is a carnivorous species, which consumes frogs, fish, insects, tadpole, snail and
earthworms [5, 6, 7]. The fish is capable of breathing atmospheric air, so that it can tolerate
the waters of low dissolved oxygen and high ammonia concentration [6, 8, 9, 10]. The fish
is known for its good flesh quality with delicate taste [11; 12; 13], and its flesh extract is
believed to contain pharmaceutical compounds that are usefull for post-operative wound
healing [12], anti-inflammation [14; 15; 16], anti-hypertension [17], and anti-hyperglicemia
[18;19]. For these reasons, snakehead is a desirable aquaculture species.
The demand of the fish is increasing particularly in the health supplement industries,
*
Corresponding author: bustarih@yahoo.com
© The Authors, published by EDP Sciences. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons
Attribution License 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
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which use the fish as a raw material for their products [19]. The bulk of fish production
comes from the wild, however, the supply is now decreasing due to overfishing and
environmental destruction [20; 21]. It is envisioned that the future supply of this fish,
will rely significantly on aquaculture. Farming of this species has been practiced in Riau.
Seed supply is available, and the fish farmer feeds the growing fish with natural food,
including golden snail, frog and earthworm [7, 22; 23]. Some researchers reported that total
substitution of natural food by artificial feed reduced growth, feed utization and biochemical
composition of the muscle [19;24]. Dietary mixture of natural and artificial feed therefore
needs to be investigated in order to assess whether this would result in the improvement of
growth and biochemical composition of the fish.
Snakehead naturally feeds on frog, earth worm and snail; thus, supplementation of these
food items in the diet may improve odor and palatability of the diets. This is in turn improves
growth and feed utilization. This research therefore was to investigate the impacts of diets
fortified with fresh frog, snail and earth worm on growth and feed utilization of snakehead.
2 Materials and Methods
2.1. Ingredients and diet formulation
Fishmeal, salted trash fish meal, tofu by product meal, rice bran, vitamin and mineral mix
were purchased from a local feedstuff supplier. All ingredients were finely ground and
analyzed for proximate composition. Natural food including fresh frog (Fejervarya
cancrivora), golden snail (Pomacea sp.) and earthworm (Lumbricus rubellus) were
purchased from local farmer in Kampar district. These were kept frozen before being used
in the dietary formulation.
Four experimental diets were prepared to compose 45% crude protein and 18.5 KJ g-1
gross energy as the optimum dietary protein and energy for snakehead [25]. Diet C (control)
was formulated using fishmeal, salted trash fish meal, tofu by product meal, rice bran,
vitamin and mineral mix. Diets F, S and W were formulated diets supplemented with 15%
fresh frog, golden snail and earthworm, respectively (Table 1). The diets were made into dry
pellets (3 mm in diameter) using a pelleting machine; and the pellets were analyzed for
proximate and amino acid composition. Pelleted diets were stored in the refrigerator (5o-
10oC) until fed to the fish.
2.2. Feeding trials
Seven hundred snakehead fingerlings, weighing 4.33-4.71 g each fish were purchased from
private hatchery in Pekanbaru. The fish were acclimatized in plastic lined tanks and fed
commercial diet for 2 weeks before feeding trial. Ten fishes were randomly collected for
initial body proximate and amino acid analysis. Four groups of fifty fishes were weighed and
randomly distributed to each of the four triplicate plastic lined tanks (1 x 1 x 1.5 m, water
depth 80 cm). Triplicate tank was randomly allocated to each diet, and feeding was
performed at 6% of fish body weight (26), twice daily at 08.00 and 16.00 for 60 days. Uneaten
feed that remained in the bottom of the tanks was siphoned out, 25% of the water was changed
and water quality was monitored every 3 days.
Table 1. Diet formulation and analysis
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Ingredients
Diet (%)
C
F
S
W
Fishmeal
41
27
28
27
Salted trash fish
24
22
24
22
Earth worm
-
15
-
-
Golden snail
-
-
15
-
Frog
-
-
-
15
Tofu by-product
17
17
16
17
Rice bran
17
18
16
18
Vitamin and mineral mixa
1
1
1
1
Proximate composition by analysis (%)
Crude protein
45.36±0.18
45.31±0.09
45.37±0.16
45.12±0.15
Crude lipid
6.69±0.26
6.79±0.23
6.74±0.23
6.89±0.23
Ash
15.23±0.18a
13.70±0.13b
13.52±0.18b
15.08±0,30a
NFE
32.72±0.22a
34.20±1.32b
34.37±0.26b
32.91±0.21a
Gross Energy (KJ g-1)b
18.81±0.06
18.81±0.16
18.97±0.05
18.75±0.05
aHasan et al., 2022
bGross energy was estimated as 16.7 KJ g-1 protein, 16.7 KJ g-1 carbohydrate and 37.7 KJ g-
1 lipid.
Values (triplicate±S.D) in the same row marked with the same superscript are not
significantly different (P>0.05).
2.3. Growth parameters
All fish were weighed at the end of feeding trial, and five fishes each tank were randomly
taken and kept in the freezer (-18oC) for analysis of proximate and amino acid composition.
Zootechnical parameters were assessed including survival rate, weight gain, specific growth
rate, feed intake, feed efficiency ratio, protein efficiency ratio and protein retention. The
values were calculated by the following formulae:
Survival rate (SR, %) = 100 × (Number of fish at final/ number of fish at initial)
Weight gain (WG, g) = Life weight of fish at the beginning ₋ life weight of fish at the end of
experiment
Specific growth rate (SGR, %/day) = 100 × [Ln (Fish weight at the beginning) ₋
Ln (Fish weight at the end)]/days
Feed intake (FI, %/day) =100 × total feed consumed/[(Fish weight at initial + fish
weight at final)/2]/days
Feed efficiency ratio (FER) = Gain in wet weight (g)/total feed consumed (g)
Protein efficiency ratio (PER) = Gain in wet weight (g)/total protein consumed (g)
Protein retention (PR, %) =100 × Gain in wet body protein (g)/protein consumed (g)
Proximate analyses were carried out following standard methods [27]. Determination of
moisture was made after oven-drying the sample at 105oC for 24 h until its weight became
constant. Determination of ash was conducted after muffle-incinerating the sample at 500oC
for 5 h. Micro-Kjeldahl procedure was used for crude protein analysis, and the value was
calculated as N × 6.25. Determination of crude lipid was performed by Soxhlet-extracting
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the sample with petroleum ether. The NFE value was estimated by difference: 100 – (crude
protein + crude lipid + ash + moisture) [28]. Amino acid analysis was performed by HPLC
(Waters, USA) using Pico-tag method following Cohen [29]. The amino acid determination
was performed with acid hydrolysis using 6 N HCl at 110oC for 24 h; and amino acid values
were estimated in g 100 g-1 sample.
2.4. Statistical analysis
Completely randomized design with four treatments, and each treatment with three
replicates was applied for this experiment. One-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was
used for data analyses, and Duncan Multiple Range Test at a significant value of 95% (P <
0.05) was employed to indicate the difference among the treatment means. The data analyses
were performed by SPSS software, version 17 [30].
3 Results and Discussion
Feed ingredients, formulation and proximate composition of the experimental diet were
presented in Table 1. All diets were prepared to contain 45% protein and 18.5 KJ g-1gross
energy. Dietary crude protein, lipid and energy by analysis were similar among the
experimental diets, but there was a small variance in ash and nitrogen free extract (NFE),
where ash was lower and NFE was higher in diets F and S compared with diets C and W.
Amino acid profiles (Table 2) varied slightly among the experimental diets. The highest total
amino acid was shown by diet supplemented with fresh earthworm (W), and followed by diet
C, S and F. The individual essential amino acids, specifically methionine; lysine and
threonine were also parallel to the total amino acids profiles of the diets. Compared to the
fish body, both total and individual essential amino acids were higher in all experimental
diets than that of the fish body. These indicate that the quantity and quality of the essential
amino acids of the experimental diets fulfill the optimum amino acids required by the fish,
because the amino acid profile of the fish body is considered as an indicator of the amino
acid balance in the fish diets [31, 32, 33, 34]. Temperature, dissolved oxygen (DO) and pH
values of the waters during the experiment were 25.90-29.800C; 4.20-5.80 ppm and 6.4-7.36
respectively. Survival rates (SR) in all treatments ranged 88.3% to 95.83%, and the values
were similar among all dietary treatments. The water quality values in this study were
acceptable and supported a high survival rate and good growth of the fish.
Supplementation of the diet with fresh frog (F) and golden snail (S) did not influence
growth performances compared with the control diet (C). However, feeding the fish with
diet containing fresh earthworm (W) obtained significantly higher weight gain (WG) than
the fish fed diet C. FER, PER and PR were not influenced by the experimental diets, but feed
intake (FI) followed the same pattern as WG, indicating that the higher WG was contributed
by high FI. Feed intake usually correlates to palatability of the diet [35], and high FI in
earthworm supplemented diet in this study was probably due to better palatability. Fresh
earthworm might act as natural feeding stimulant which gave strong odor and good flavor to
the diet. It was reported that snakehead highly responded to feeds with strong smell [36]. The
FI of fish has been known to correlate with the amount and the kind of dietary free amino
acids [35, 37]. In this study, the amount of free amino acids such as aspartic acid, glutamic
acid, serine, alanine, glycine, threonine which significantly contributed to the palatability of
the diets [38], were higher in the earthworm supplemented diet than the other diets. These
free amino acid may give palatability to the diet, in turn increase feed intake.
Table 2. Amino acid profiles of the experimental diets and snakehead (g 100 g−1sample)
Amino acids
Snakehead
Diets
C
F
S
W
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Non-essential amino acid
Aspartic acid
2.89
3.78
3.22
3.56
3.87
Glutamic acid
4.22
5.57
5.17
5.34
5.85
Serine
1.20
2.01
1.55
1.88
1.94
Glycine
1.73
2.25
2.19
2.15
2.36
Arginine
1.28
1.77
1.37
1.56
1.86
Proline
1.52
2.18
1.82
1.93
2.31
Tyrosine
0.45
0.96
0.76
0.85
0.93
Cysteine
0.67
0.96
0.80
0.88
1.05
Sub Total
13.96
19.48
16.88
18.15
20.17
Essential amino acid
Histidine
0.56
0.91
0.65
0.78
0.87
Threonine
0.87
1.13
1.08
1.09
1.22
Alanine
1.01
1.52
1.35
1.40
1.63
Valine
1.10
1.63
1.38
1.50
1.75
Methionine
0.60
0.84
0.65
0.72
0.87
Isoleucine
0.94
1.35
1.05
1.28
1.41
Leucine
1.34
3.04
2.60
2.87
3.14
Phenylalanine
0.86
1.16
1.04
1.12
1.20
Lysine
1.12
1.75
1.58
1.70
1.86
Sub Total
8.4
13.33
11.38
12.46
13.95
Total
22.36
32.81
28.26
30.61
34.12
The fact that the protein retention values were not significantly influenced by the
experimental diets is an indication that all experimental diets had balanced profiles in their
essential amino acids. Protein retention values usually depend on the quality of dietary
essential amino acid profile [31, 32, 39, 40, 41], and the essential amino acid profile of the
experimental diets in this study, especially lysine, methionine and threonine were balanced,
as indicated by their profiles which were even higher than the essential amino acid profile of
the snakehead. Therefore, the dietary nutrients were utilized efficiently, which in turn
resulted in better protein retention.
Table 3. Growth performance of snakehead fed experimental diets for 60 days
Parameter
Diets
C
F
S
W
Initial weight
4.71±0.22
4.41±0.21
4.33±0.25
4.60±0.15
Final weight
13.98±1.38a
14.67±0.57a
13.66±0.25a
15.36±0.15b
Survival rate
88.33±3.12
89.17±8.25
88.38±5.89
95.83±2.36
Weight gain
8.93±1.22a
9.19±0.37a
9.33±0.19ab
10.76±0.06b
Specific growth rate
1.77±0.20
1.88±0.07
1.92±0.08
2.01±0.04
Feed intake
5.14±0.23a
5.22±0.11a
5.34±0.17ab
5.62±0.23b
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Feed efficiency ratio
4.05±0.53
3.83±0.23
3.84±0.19
3.85±0.16
Protein efficiency ratio
0.55±0.06
0.58±0.03
0.58±0.03
0.58±0.02
Protein retention
34.23±4.14
35.73±2.00
35.77±1.88
35.51±1.49
Values (triplicate±S.D) in the same row marked with the same superscript are not
significantly different (P>0.05)
4 Conclusion
Supplementation of fresh earthworm in snakehead diet increased growth and feed intake, but
inclusion of frog and golden snail in the diets did not affect any performance of the fish as
compared with the control diet. Therefore, fresh earthworm may be supplemented in
snakehead diets to improve growth and diet acceptability by the fish, which in turn reduces
feed dependence on natural food.
4.1. Acknowledgment
The authors wish to acknowledge the University of Riau for financial assistance, No
8313/UN19.5.1.3/AL.04/2023. Appreciations are also extended to Mr. Syafril, for field
technical assistance and Mr. Syafrudin, director of Mutiara Feed, for pelleted feed
preparation.
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