The hatchery facilities of a reputable fish farm in Abeokuta were used to carry out studies on the effects of different diets on the survival of African catfish Clarias gariepinus hatchlings. The larvae (1.8mg each) were distributed into the twelve feeding experiment apartments (1.7 m × 0.7 m x 0.5 m each) at 1,500 lavae/apartment. On the fourth day, feeding commenced with the experimental diets. The diets were fish meal (Danish) of 72% Crude Protein; baker's yeast (VAHINE); compounded feed (50% Crude Protein) and hen egg yolk. Each treatment was replicated thrice and feed fed to the larvae at 30% body weight twice daily for 30 days. All the experimental diets had no significant effects on the growth of the larvae to fingerling at P > 0.05. The mean fingerlings final weight (mg) was 1523.2 ±295, 1700.8 ± 686, 367.9 ± 118 and 1675.9 ± 1167 for fish meal, yeast, compounded feed and hen egg yolk respectively. The specific and relative growth rates of the larvae under all the treatments were also not significant (P > 0.05). Considering the growth parameters, the best performance was observed in fish fed diet 2 (yeast), closely followed by diet 4 (hen egg yolk), then diet 1 (fish meal) and least in fish fed diet 3 (compounded feed). The low survival rate observed in all the diets, Compounded feed (10%) > hen egg yolk (4.1%) > Fish meal(3.5%) > yeast(1.7%) could be attributed to the lack of sorting exercise carried out in the experiment.

This study examined the length-weight relation and condition factor of Tillapia zilli in River Yobe, Northeast, Nigeria. Three hundred fifty fish species were collected from commercial fishers at selected landing sites within the study area between June and November 2020. The morphometric and meristic characteristics examined varies due to environmental variations such as water temperature, stress, food availability, spawning ground, fishing intensity, and sex. The mean condition factor shows no significant difference (P < 0.05) throughout the sampling period. A linear relationship was established W = 0.4667 L1.1279 and significant at P < 0.01 with b value indicating a negative allometric growth pattern. The correlation coefficient (r2 = 0.5212) indicated that LWR model is reliable. This study provides baselines on length-weight relation and condition factor of Tillapia zilli in River Yobe. Thus further research should be encouraged on the water body for sustainable utilization, decision making, and policy formulation.

Fish and fisheries products are considered as one of the most substantial parts of Nigeria economy. Demand for these products is on the high side due to the rapid growth of human population, changes in lifestyle and eating habits. Fishery is thus serving as a source of employment, income generation and food security. This paper made use of the data gathered from the farm and household levels to analyse the economics of catfish hatchery farming and its contribution to household poverty alleviation in Oyo and Osun States, Southwest Nigeria, using profitability analyses, Foster-Greer-Thorbecke index and Tobit regression models. The findings indicate that fish hatchery farming is profitable, altough 43.1% of fish hatchery farmers interviewed were above the poverty line. Thus, the enterprise significantly (p < 0.05) reduced poverty in the study area. Furthermore, the effects of socioeconomic variables, gender, education level, and framing experience (p < 0.01); marital status and household size (p < 0.1); labour employed, hatchery units, quality of fish seed produced and membership of cooperative society (p < 0.05) indicating several interactions between poverty and the variables analysed. In conclusion, policy makers, government and non-governmental organisation should give the enterprise adequate attention and support as this could be adopted in lifting the country from poverty.