EVALUATION OF CONDITION FACTORS WITH STOMACH CONTENT OF Clarias gariepinus IN RIVER GWALLAGA, BAUCHI STATE

Abstract

This study was aimed at investigating some biological aspects of Clarias gariepinus Cought in River Gwallaga Bauchi state. The river was divided into four stations: head water (Jamaa), upper middle (Rafin Shaa), and lower middle (Maleka) and tail water (Jamjale) as stations A, B, C and D respectively. Ten (10) Clarias gariepinus were caught fortnightly from each station during the dry season (February - April 2019) and wet season (May – August 2019). A total of 480 fish were collected during the period of the research. Morphometric indices of the fish were measured. The fish were dissected, gut length and stomach weight were measured and stomach content were identified. The data obtained were used to determine morphometric relationships through correlation and regression analysis, using Microsoft Excel 2007 version. The stomach content analysis of C. gariepinus revealed Plant Parts had the highest importance index of 50.37 in the dry season and 28.81 in the Wet season out of the five feed items found in the stomach. Chi-square (X2 =29.27; df = 12 P> 0.05) (X2 18.20; df = 9; P> 0.05) showed that there was association between stomach repletion of the fish and the stations from which they were caught in wet and dry Seasons respectively. The average condition factor (K) of fish from station A (K = 0.6818), B (k = 0.5458), C (K = 0.8132) and D (k = 0.5510) for dry season and wet season: A (K = 0.526758), B (k = 0.589765), C (K = 0.738035) and D (k = 0.725151). All the K-value were less than 1; It can be concluded that C. gariepinus caught in River Gwallaga were not in good physiological condition and association between fish stomach repletion level and station from which they were caught; shows that feed items in the fish stomach was inadequate. Therefore, it is recommended that fertilization and some form of supplementary feeding practice should be carried out particularly in the dry season.