Blood profiles of African catfish Clarias gariepinus fingerlings fed diets supplemented with three strains of Lactobacillus plantarum.

A 10-week feeding trial was carried out to evaluate strain-specific effects of Lactobacillus plantarum on blood profiles of African catfish Clarias gariepinus fingerlings. A catfish diet was formulated and divided into five portions (experimental diets). The first portion served as control (with no probiotic added to it, labeled as NP) while the second portion received 2.5g kg-1 multi-species commercial probiotics (CP). The third, fourth and fifth portions were the experimental diets that contained 2×109cfu/g of L. plantarum strains of ascension numbers LC333558, LC333559 and LC333560, and labeled as LP58, LP59 and LP60, respectively. Fifteen apparently healthy C gariepinus fingerlings (4.86±0.59g) were stocked in an experimental tank of 70 litres capacity, while the experimental feed was fed to the fish in triplicate tanks. Similar rearing conditions were maintained in all experimental tanks. The results showed significant (p<0.05) difference between the fish fed control diet and probiotics supplementation diets in some of the haematological parameters examined. Probiotics supplementations did not affect total and differential leukocytes among different experimental groups. Except for RBC counts, fish groups fed with strains LB59 and LB60 had similar effects and appeared to have better haematological values than groups fed with LB58. Strains-specific effect of L. planatrum was also observed in creatinine levels among the experimental groups. Hence, it can be concluded that strains of L. plantarum affected some haematological parameters of C. gariepinus fingerlings positively, while dietary supplementation of L. plantarum LC333559 strain could be employed to improve haematological parameters of C. gariepinus fingerlings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]