Growth performance of red breasted tilapia (coptodon rendalli) fed maize bran and Amaranthus hybridus leaves under pond culture

: A study was carried out to evaluate the effect of substituting Amaranthus hybridus leaves for maize bran as feed on growth of juvenile Coptodon rendalli . Fresh chopped Amaranthus hybridus (100%) and dried milled maize bran (100%) and mixture of fresh chopped Amaranthus hybridus and maize bran (50:50) were given as different dietary treatments. The three diets were fed to triplicate groups of fish fingerlings (9.68±0.16 g) stocked in 100m 2 ponds and fed at 5% of body weight for 84 days. The diets of Amaranthus hybridus, maize bran and combination of Amaranthus hybridus and maize bran produced insignificantly differences ( P >0.05) in final weight gain, where with Amaranthus hybridus producing average weights of 33.57 ± 1.15 g, Maize bran with average weights of 31.01 ± 1.05 g and a combination producing average weight of 34.42 ± 1.15g. The Apparent feed conversion ratios and Specific growth rates (SGR) didn‟t significantly differ ( P >0.05) among the treatments. There were also no significant differences ( P >0.05) in total lengths at termination of (84 days) and it ranged from 120.72±0.14 mm to 124.83±0.10 mm whose stocking mean length ranged from 81.55±0.31 mm to 82.87±0.21 mm. Survival rates ranged from 98.70% to 99.96% and didn‟t differ significantly ( P >0.05) among treatments. These results indicate that the feeding of Coptodon rendalli with only Amaranthus hybridus or Maize bran or a combination of Amaranthus hybridus and Maize bran produce a similar result. The present study demonstrates that in the event that maize bran is unavailable, Amaranthus hybridus can substitute it as fish feed or its combination would produce similar results.