Department of Fisheries and Aquaculture, University of Agriculture, Makurdi, Benue state, Nigeria
The present study evaluates the nutritional potential of four different plant leaves as alternative to conventional feed ingredients for fish feed production. These leaves include;moringa leaf meal, leucaena leaf meal, sweet potato leaf meal, groundnut leaf meal, and cassava leaf. The crude protein content of the ingredientsranged from 21.88 to 36.05% and the crude lipid contents were recorded as 2.13 to 3.84% with moringa leave meal having the highest value. All the tested ingredients contained phytic acid (10.69 to 16.49 mg/100g), oxalate (494.00 to 879.50 mg/100g) tannin (52.78 to 136.93 mg/100g) and cyanide (4.36 to 10.53 mg/100g) with moringa also having higher content of these antinutrients. It however expected that with appropriate processing methods this ingredients can be made more suitable for incorporation in fish feed.
Key words: Crude protein, lipid, ANFs, unconventional feed stuff.