Vol. 9, Special Issue 4, Part G (2025)

Taurine is a conditionally essential amino acid in fish nutrition. The present study addressed practical application and evaluated the impact of soybean meal diets supplemented with dietary taurine as an additive, on growth and nutrient utilization of tilapia, Oreochromis mossambicus, in addition to determination of maximum incorporation level of taurine in its feed. The experimental design was completely randomized with one control and four treatments. Control and each treatment had three replicates. A total number of 150 healthy Oreochromis mossambicus fry with an average weight of 29.6±0.033 g were stocked in fifteen water tanks of 100 Litre capacity. Total five iso-nitrogenous (30% CP) iso-caloric (6% CL) feeds were prepared with taurine supplementation of 0, 0.5, 1.0, 1.5 and 2% respectively. Feed was provided ad libitum three times daily at 9:00 am, 12:00 noon and 5:00 pm. The water quality parameters like temperature, pH, dissolved oxygen (DO), ammonia were monitored on weekly basis and the growth response at the end of feeding experiment was recorded. On the experimental trial the fish fed with 1.5% supplemented taurine showed significant difference (p<0.05) in all parameters like weight gain (39.23±0.9), specific growth rate (0.81±0.1), the nutrient utilization factors like FCR (1.54±0.02), PER (2.16±0.23), LRE (0.025±0.004). It was concluded that the plant based feed supplemented with 1.5% of taurine results in comparatively higher growth & better nutrient utilization of Oreochromis mossambicus.