EFFECTS OF LIME (CITRUSAURANTIIFOLIA) AQUEOUS EXTRACT ON BACTERIA ISOLATED FROM CULTURED FRESH CATFISH (CLARIASGARIEPINUS)

The increasing concern about antibiotic resistance and food safety has led to a search for alternative antimicrobial agents. This study was carried at Department of Science Laboratory Technology, Faculty of Natural Science, University of Jos. The study was aimed at studying the effect of lime (Citrusaurantiifolia) aqueous extract on bacteria Escherichia coli, Proteus, Samonella aureus, Samonella epidermis, Bacillus subtilis isolated from cultured fresh catfish. The bacteria were isolated using Gentamycin to inhibit the growth of probable bacteria, 10g of the gills of the fish was dropped into 90ml of sterile distilled water and a five folds serial dilution was carried out The extract was tested against a range of bacterial species, including Escherichia coli, Proteus, Samonella aureus, Samonella epidermis, Bacillus subtilis .The microbial count of the samples were determined by making five dilutions, The third dilution was inoculated on (PCA) plates incubated at 37% for 24hours where the visible colonies were counted and the results showed that the microbial load count of catfish from old Bukuru park has the highest microbial load of 5.30 x 104 and number of colonies while that of West of mines exhibited the lowest with 4.00 x 104 .The characterization and identification of bacteria from samples was done both macroscopically and microscopically from the 24hrs cultured plates. The macroscopic isolated was characterized based on their cultural morphology such as texture, pigment, elevation, margin, consistency, opacity and shape. While the microscopic isolates were identified based on biochemical and physiological characteristics. The invitro test for sensitivity was also carried out where it was found out that Escherichia Coli exhibited the lowest level of sensitivity and Samonellaepidermis exhibited the highest level of sensitivity. The minimum inhibitory was also carried out with all being negative there was no growth on the plates, this may be due to the method of extraction. The characterization and identification of bacterial isolates using molecular techniques (Muller Hinton) provided valuable insights into the microbial diversity of catfish aquaculture. Conduct experiments to evaluate the effectiveness of lime aqueous extract in controlling bacterial infections in catfish under real-world aquaculture conditions.The results demonstrated that the lime extract exhibited significant antimicrobial activity against a range of bacterial isolates, including, Escherichia coli, Proteus, Samonella aureus, Samonella epidermis, Bacillus subtilis.