Effects of dietary Lactobacillus fermentum and Saccharomyces cerevisiae on the growth performance, hematological parameters, organ-somatic indices, and protection of Heterobranchus bidorsalis juveniles against Aeromonas hydrophila infection

ABSTRACT

The use of probiotic diets in protecting Heterobranchus bidorsalis against pathogenic organisms is important in order to maximize yield, hence a 12 week feeding trial was conducted with diets containing Lactobacillus fermentum (Lf), Saccharomyces cerevisiae (Sc), and their combination (LfSc) to determine the diets that maximized fish growth hence, Lf¹, Sc², and LfSc³ were obtained. The health protective effect of these diets was further examined by challenging randomly selected thirty fish (145.29 ± 3.72 g) per treatment, with Aeromonas hydrophila solution for an hour, and placed in the experimental diets in three replicates for thirty days. The pre- and post-challenge data showed highest mortality (30%) in the control experiment over the fortified diets. Highest packed cell volume (58.00 ± 1.84%) was recorded in Sc² at post-challenge. All the examined organs of fish fed control diet had the highest microbial load. Conclusively, diet Sc² should be embraced for the production of fast growing and disease resistant H. bidorsalis.

KEYWORDS:

• Pathogenic organisms
• challenge-test
• blood components
• enterobacteria
• probiotics

Disclosure statement

The authors of this publication hereby declare we have no conflict of interest