Effects of Salinity on Growth Performance and Blood Parameters of Butter Catfish, Ompok bimaculatus

Abstract

The study was conducted in laboratory conditions to evaluate the effects of salinity on growth, survival, and blood chemistry of butter catfish, Ompok bimaculatus fingerlings. The fry, initially sized as 7.01 cm length and 1.69 g weight, were assigned in four different salinity treatments i.e., 0 ppt ($T_C$), 2 ppt ($T_1$ ), 4 ppt ($T_2$ ) and 8 ppt ($T_3$ ) with three replications, with 21 fry in each replication as well. Fish were fed commercial catfish diets with 43% protein and 8% lipid at 5% body weight three times a day for 90 days. The control ($T_C$) treatment showed the significantly highest growth perfor mance among treatments, (p