• Corpus ID: 55585716

The Composition, Ranking and Diversity of Callinectes amnicola (De Rochebrune, 1883) Food from Okpoka Creek, Niger Delta, Nigeria

@article{George2009TheCR,
  title={The Composition, Ranking and Diversity of Callinectes amnicola (De Rochebrune, 1883) Food from Okpoka Creek, Niger Delta, Nigeria},
  author={Awoteinm Dateme Isaiah George and Jasper Freeborn Nestor Abowei},
  journal={Advance Journal of Food Science and Technology},
  year={2009},
  volume={1},
  pages={12-18}
}

• A. George, J. Abowei
• Published 1 December 2009
• Environmental Science
• Advance Journal of Food Science and Technology

The composition, ranking and diversity of Callinectes amnicola food from Okpoka creek was studied for a period of two years (January 2006-December 2007). The total of nine hundred and thirty (930) stomachs examined, five hundred and sixty representing (60.2%) had food items while three hundred and seventy (39.8%) were empty. The highest percentage empty stomachs (80.0%) were recorded in August 2007 while the lowest (16.7%) was observed in March 2006. The food items observed in the stomachs were Crustacea, Pisces, Mollusca, Annelids, plant materials, sand grains and unidentified masses. Crustacea consisted of shrimp parts and crab appendages. Pisces consisted of fish flesh, fish scales and fish bones/spines. Mollusca consisted of bivalve shells; bivalve tissues and gastropod shells while the plant materials were made up of higher plant parts and algae cells. The ranking of the individual food items in the gastric stomachs of C. amnicola in a descending order of magnitude using the three analytical methods show ed that, the frequency of occurrence method showed that, bivalve shells scored (14.4%); closely followed by shrimp parts (13.4%) gastropod shells (12.6%), fish bones/spines (11.9%), fish scales (10.6%) and crab appendages (10.1%). Annelids (1.6%) occurred the least. The numerical method showed that, shrimp parts and bivalve shells were the highest by number with 13.2% each; closely followed by fish bones/spines (12.6%), algae cells (11.0%) and gastropod shells (10.2%). Others were fish scales (8.7%), crab appendages (7.7%), sand grains (6.6%) and fish flesh (4.7%). Annelids were the least in occurrence with 1.3%. Bivalve shells (14.6%) scored the highest point, closely followed by shrimp parts (14.%) and then fish bones/spines (13.9%). The lowest point was scored by annelids (1.9%). (7.7%), sand grains (6.6%) and fish flesh (4.7%). The result shows a high diversity in food intake. The diversity indexes (H and J) estimated, revealed high diversity (H=1.0186) in food intake with relative diversity or evenness (J=0.9144) approaching one (1).