Abstract
The feeding trials have been conducted with young carps to study the deficiency symptoms and requirement of vitamin B6. The basal diet used was that devised by HALVER et al.3) except that vitamin B6 was eliminated. The fishes were fed the diets containing varying levels of vitaminB6 for 10-week experimental period at 25°C under constant flow of dechlorinated city water. The diet of group 8 was added deoxypyridoxine hydrochloride to facilitate the development of the deficiency symptoms (Table 1). The carps receiving the vitamin below 0.04 mg per kg of body weight per day decreased average weight, showed considerably high mortalities and developed the deficiency symptoms after 4 to 6 weeks feeding (Fig. 1 and Table 2). Nervous disorders were main deficiency symptom developed when no antipyridoxine was added to the diet, whereas edema, hemorrhage, exophthalmos and skin disturbance were predominant in the presence of deoxypyridoxine (Table 3). The activities of glutamic-pyruvic and glutamic-oxalacetic transaminases (GPT and GOT) and vitaminB6 content of hepatopancreas were found to be strongly influenced by the vitamin intake of the fish (Table 4). From the results obtained the vitamin B6 requirement of young carps was tentatively decided to be adout 0.15mg (as hydrochloride) per kg of body weight per day under the present experimental conditions.
