The effects of different levels of dietary curcumin on growth performance and skin color of Oscar fish Astronotus ocellatus (Agassiz, 1831)

This study was carried out to evaluate the effects of different levels of dietary curcumin on growth performance and skin color of Oscar fish (Astronotus ocellatus). A total of 150 Oscar fish with initial average weight of 5.1 ± 0.25 g were randomly distributed in 15 aquariums and fed with 5 different levels of curcumin including control group without any curcumin (C0), 5(C5), 10(C10), 15(C15) and 20(C20) g  curcumin kg-1 diet for 56 days. Fish fed with 5 g kg-1 diet showed significantly higher final body weight and specific growth rate compared to those fed the control treatment (P<0.05). Fish fed with 5 g kg -1 curcumin had significantly lower FCR than the control treatment (P<0.05). There were significant different in protein and lipid efficiency ratio between C0 and C20 treatment (P<0.05). curcumin concentration of skin in fish fed C20 treatment was significantly higher than fish fed C0 treatment (P<0.05). The results of the present study showed that 5 g curcumin kg-1 diet improves growth performance and 15 g curcumin kg-1 diet significantly enhances skin color in Oscar fish.