Effectiveness of Pituitary Gland Extract of Snakehead Fish (Parachanna obscura; Gunther, 1861) in Induced Breeding of Cat Fish (Clarias gariepinus; Burchell, 1822) in Sokoto North Western Nigeria

This research investigated the effectiveness of P. obscura pituitary gland extract in hypophysation of C. gariepinus. The experiment was laid out in a Completely Randomized Design (CRD), using the pituitary gland of C. gariepinus as the control hormone. Data, such as Temperature, Dissolved Oxygen Concentration, and weight of eggs stripped, egg count/gram, latency period, incubation period etc. Data collected were subjected to Independent sample T-test, to statistically evaluate the effectiveness of the test (P. obscura pituitary gland extract) hormone in the hypophysation of C. gariepinus. The latency period of P. obscura was found to extend for 2 hours beyond those injected with C. gariepinus pituitary. The Pituitary gland extract was able to induced maturation ovulation for fertilization. The induced eggs were fertilized and incubated for a period of 12 hours, due to the low viability of the eggs, fluctuation in Temperature and low Dissolved oxygen during the incubation period, the experiment was terminated after 12 hours of close monitoring. a minimum DO concentration recorded was 1.27 mg/L and 1.75 mg/L for eggs injected with C. gariepinus and P. obscura pituitary gland extract respectively. It was therefore concluded that subsequent research on hypophysation of the pituitary gland extract of P. obscura can be adopted for the successful fertilization and hatching and this should be tried in farms and fish hatcheries for its effectiveness