research article: effect of a commercial probiotic (supersets® and varna®) on growth performance, hematological indices, and immunological parameters in sturgeon hybrid bester (huso huso ♂× acipenser ruthenus ♀) fingerling

The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of dietary supplementation of a commercial probiotic containing bacillus subtilis, lactobacillus acidophilus, l. delbrueckii, l. rhamnosus, and l. plantarum on growth performance, hematological and immunological parameters of bester fingerlings. two-hundred and forty fingerlings (10±0.9 g) were randomly distributed into 12 fiberglass tanks. the experimental diets were formulated using 0 (control), 100 (t100), 200 (t200), and 300 (t300) mg/kg of the probiotic. the fish were fed at 3% of body weight for 8 weeks. the result revealed that dietary probiotics increased final weight, condition factor, daily growth rate, specific growth rate, and body weight increase (p>0.05). also, we observed a significant increase in feed efficiency ratio and protein efficiency ratio for fish fed with t300 compared to t200 (p<0.05). hematological parameters were not influenced by dietary probiotic levels (p>0.05). there were no significant differences in total immunoglobulin (p>0.05), while alternative complement activity was significantly enhanced by the inclusion of probiotics in diets (p<0.05). the present study showed that feed efficiency, protein efficiency, and immunological parameters of bester fingerling have been improved by adding the commercial probiotic at 200 mg/kg.