Odo SN, Iwuji AC, Odo MK and Urama KU

Fish abundance and well-being is dependent on the condition of their inhabiting environments and it can be estimated with length-weight relationship and condition factor. In this survey, the abundance of cichlid and length-weight relationships with condition factor ‘K’ of four dominated species were studied for 10 Months (February, 2019 - November, 2019). A total of 638 individual fish belonging to nine species; Oreochromis niloticus (316, 46.68%), Oreochromis aureus (77, 11.37%), Hemichromis fasciatus (35, 5.17), Tilapia zilli (230, 33.90%), tilapia daget (8, 1.18%), Tilapia guineensis (1, 0.01%) Tilapia mariae (2, 0.03%), Tylochromis jintkin (4, 0.04%) and Sarotherodon galileaus (5, 0.07%).Ecological index were high; dominance-D (0.322-0478), Simpson index (0.522-0.678), Shannon_H (1.035-1.267), evenness (0.4226-0.8041 and Margelef (0.775-1.772). Wellbeing of four dominants species were Oreochromis nioloticus [ condition factor, k ranged from 0.69-5.59 (1.79), b (2.83) and r(0.88)], Tilapia zilli [k ranged from 1.39-3.05 (2.02), b(3.32), and r(0.93)], Oreochomis aureus [ k ranged 0.29 -2.90 (1.56), b(1.57) and r(0.90) and Hemichromis fasciatus [k ranged from 0.39-2.57(1.87), b (2.27) and r(0.82)]. The ‘b’ value for the three dominant species showed negative allometric growth whereas Tilapia zilli exhibited positive allometric growth in weight (b>3). The present study provided the first baseline data about LWRs and relative condition factor of cichlidae fish species from Anambra River Basin and as such the data is valuable for establishing a monitoring and management system of these fish species.

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