Growth performance and survival of three African Catfish (Clarias gariepinus, Burchell 1882) strains reared in hapas in Kenya.

Abstract

This study was conducted to compare the growth performance and survival of three strains of African catfish (Clarias gariepinus) cultured in Kenya. Three strains originally from the Netherlands (Dutch), Indonesia, and Kenya,(LakeVictoria) were studied. C. gariepinus having an average initial body length of 3.87 cm and weight of 0.51 g were stocked at 6 fish m2 in triplicate in 2.0 m × 2.0 m × 1m hapa nets mounted in an earthen pond.The fish were fed with commercial catfish diet 45% crude protein (Skretting fish feed Ltd).The results showed that the Indonesian strain had the best growth and had significantly (P < 0.05) higher final mean body weight (287.20±16.78g) and mean daily weight gain (1.37± 0.06%). Specific growth rate (SGR) was not significantly different in the Dutch and Indonesian strain (P > 0.05). The FCR of the Indonesian strain (1.03 ± 0.00) was significantly (P <0.05) lower than the Kenyan and the Dutch strains which had similar FCR.The survival of the three strains was not significantly different (P> 0.05). However, the survival of the Dutch strain was higher (65.00±12.58%) compared to the other strains with the Kenyan strain exhibiting the lowest survival of 59.52±9.52%.There were no significant differences (P > 0.05) in Coefficient of Variation (CV) in the Dutch and the Indonesian strain, and the highest CV was recorded in the Kenyan strain. The overall conclusion is that growth performance between the three strains of C. gariepinus was significantly different and thus, it is crucial to select the right strain for production purposes depending on availability.