Probiotic supplementation improved the growth and health, status of Nile tilapia

Aquaculture industry is the fastest-growing food production sector supporting almost 50% of all aquatic foods for human consumption. This study was aimed probiotic supplementation to improve the growth and health status of Nile tilapia. Fingerlings with mean initial body weight of 11.43 ± 1.27 g and mean initial body length of 6.2 ± 0.84 cm were stocked in 12 happas. They fed four times a day diet contains 30% of crude protein at 5% of their body weight and reared for two months. The four treatments were triplicated as a control diet, and the three experimental diets fortified with Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Lactobacillus fermentum and their combinations at a dosage of (1.5 × 108 CFU/ml) fed for two rearing months. Growth performance and gut pathogenic microbes of fish were investigated. Results indicated that the highest growth performance was achieved in treatments of Lactobacillus fermentum with body weight gain of 33.43 ± 1.65 g, daily growth rate of 0.51 ± 0.05 g, feed conversion ratio 1.89 ± 0.10, protein efficiency ratio, 1.78 ± 0.09 whereas, the lowest growth performance was achieved in treatments fed with control diet 19.83 ± 2.23, 0.33 ± 0.04, 3.52 ± 0.39, and 0.97 ± 0.11 respectively. Pathogens like Salmonella, Shigella, E. coli and Proteius were detected when sampled fish were gut dissected for investigation of Nile tilapia (O. niloticus) of treated with fish group treated with control diet and these pathogens were not detected in fish group treated with experimental diet post treatment with probiotics. Finally, study confirmed that supplementation of probiotics in diets enhanced the growth performance, nutrient utilization, feed conversion ratio and improved health status than fish fed on the control diet (P ≤ 0.05) of Nile tilapia (O. niloticus) reared under pond culture condition