Int. J. Aquat. Biol. (2016) 4(5): 325-329:
ISSN: 2322-5270; P-ISSN: 2383-0956
Journal homepage: www.ij-aquaticbiology.com
© 2016 Iranian Society of Ichthyology
Original Article
Occurrence of Orthetrum abbotti Calvert (1892) (Odonata, Libellulidae) and intraguild
predation on Clarias gareipinus Burchell, 1822 (Suliformes, Clariidae) and Oreochromis
niloticus L., 1758 (Perciformes, Cichlidae) fry in Lagos fish farms
Abiodun Akinpelu Denloye*1, Oyindamola Azeezat Alafia1, Kafayat Oluwakemi Ajelara1, Oluwaseun Olusegun Babalola1,
Olanrewaju Abayomi Dosumu2, Fatai Gbolahan Owodeinde3, Oluwaseun Oluyomi Solomon1
1Department of Zoology and Environmental Biology, Faculty of Science, Lagos State University, Ojo, Lagos, Nigeria.
2Department of Mathematical Sciences, Lagos State University, Ojo, Lagos, Nigeria.
3Department of Fisheries, Lagos State University, Ojo, Lagos, Nigeria.
Article history:
Received 15 July 2016
Accepted 8 October 2016
Available online 2 5 October 2016
Keywords:
Intraguild predation
Orthetrum abbotti
Fish farms
Dragonfly nymph
Abstract: Intraguild predation occurs when species competing for the same resource prey upon or
parasitize one another. This may result in economic losses under commercial circumstances. A
survey of the insect species of fish farms in Badagry and Ojo Areas of Lagos State, Nigeria was
carried out followed by an evaluation of the predatory ability of Orthetrum abbotti nymphs on fish
fry. Nymph predation was evaluated in the laboratory against fry of Clarias gariepinus and
Oreochromis niloticus. Samples of insects were randomly collected from 10 earthen ponds, 10
concrete ponds and the vegetation surrounding the ponds and identified over a period of 12 weeks
from three study fish farms. Six species of insects belonging to four orders namely Notonecta
unifasciata, Gerris remigis, O. abbotti, Aedes aegypti, Dysticus marginalis and Acentria ephemerella
syn. niveus were collected from the ponds. Studies on feeding preference of 5th nymphal instar of
O. abbotti on fry of C. gariepinus and O. niloticus over other food types revealed that the dragonfly
preferred to feed more on C. gariepinus fry than on O. niloticus although there was no significant
difference in the number of O. niloticus and C. gariepinus fry preyed upon by O. abbotti nymphs.
Introduction
Insects play important roles in the aquatic
ecosystem, apart from being tools to reveal
information about the water quality and ecology of a
particular water body; they are also crucial in
balancing the aquatic ecosystem. More importantly,
Odonates are good indicators for monitoring
anthropogenic impacts on freshwater ecosystems. In
small water bodies such as ponds, myriads of insect
such as dragonflies, caddisflies and mayflies spend
most of their lives in the pond feeding on larvae of
other insect, plant matter, decaying vegetation and
algae (Cardoba-Aguilar, 2008).
Most aquatic insects are predacious feeders, and
the predatory effect of dragonflies larvae on aquatic
organisms, including catfish and tilapia fry are
* Corresponding author: Abiodun Akinpelu Denloye
E-mail address: bio_denloye@yahoo.com
becoming alarming leading to annual colossal losses
(Adeyemo et al., 1997). The predatory habit of
dragonfly larvae on other co-occurring species may
be as a result of competition for limiting resources
such as food and is referred to as Intraguild Predation
(IGP) (Berg et al., 2012). Vashini and Ganagappan
(2014) stated that odonate nymphs are very efficient
predators in lowland streams and ponds. According
to Sulem and Brummett (2006), about 9% of total
Clarias gariepinus larval mortality in earthen pond in
Cameroun was attributed to predation by aquatic
insects. Nguenga et al. (2000) identified predation as
the major cause of low and viable survival of
C. gariepinus in Cameroun. Basically, predation by
birds, amphibians and other fishes are believed to be
more than in aquatic insects although, Rashed (2005)
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Denloye et al./ Occurrence of Orththrum abbotti and intraguild predation in Lagos fish farms
explained that aquatic insect’s predation may exceed
avian predation in some localities.
Considering the importance of C. gariepinus and
Oreochromis niloticus to fish farming in African
countries, it is imperative to understand the feeding
preference of dragonfly (Orthetrum abbotti) nymphs
for fry of C. gariepinus and O. niloticus. The first
part of this study reported here assessed the
entomofauna of three fish farms and the second
evaluated the feeding preference of the dragonfly,
O. abbotti.
Materials and Methods
Study sites: Three farms were studied in Ojo and
Badagry area of Lagos State, namely Lagos State
University (LASU) farm (site A) (in Ojo area),
Anetekhai farm (site B) and Bombata farm (site C)
(sites B and C are located in Badagry area). The
farms rear C. gariepinus and O. niloticus for research
and commercial purposes. In all the three farms,
ponds are in close proximity to vegetation growing
on sandy loam soil.
Site A (LASU Farm) is surrounded by few
buildings and tall grasses with vegetable farm about
500 metres away from the fish ponds and hatching
earthen ponds and hatchery. Site B (Anetekhai farm)
and Site C (Bombata farm) were surrounded
respectively with few buildings and sparse
vegetation. Fish is reared in earthen ponds in site B
while in Site C, fish is reared in concrete tanks.
Anetekhai farm uses rectangular earthen ponds,
while Bombata farm use only concrete ponds. All the
farms are very close to the vegetation. At each site,
sampling areas were demarcated with the use of
measuring tapes, into Zones A-D. Each sampling
zone is about 500 m apart and collection was done at
different parts of the zones.
Insect collection and identification: Collection of
insect was done fortnightly for a period of six
months. Sampling was started in August 2005 which
represent the period of “break” in rain in Lagos State.
Light traps, pitfall traps and sweep nets were used to
collect larvae as well as adult insects from 10 earthen
ponds and 10 concrete ponds and the vegetation
around the ponds, respectively. Insect collection was
done twice daily, in the early morning 0700-1000 hr
and later in the afternoon 1400-1800 hr. Insects were
collected from the ponds and the surrounding
vegetation. The collected insects were killed in hot
boiling water and thereafter placed in 70% alcohol
for preservation and identification was done by
comparison with already identified specimens in
insect collections at University of Lagos and
University of Ibadan, respectively (Denloye et al.,
2014).
Feeding preference of O. abbotti: Nymphs of
O. abbotti were obtained from the Lagos State
University pond. Only the 5th nymphal instars were
used following Suling et al. (2004). Nymphs were
acclimatized with aquatic weeds to simulate their
natural habitat in pond water for 48 hours before
commencement of the experiment.
Fry of C. gariepinus and O. niloticus weighing 0.1
g and mean length of 0.92±0.03 cm and 0.87±0.02
cm, respectively were obtained from the hatchery of
Lagos State University. The fry (6-8 days post
hatching) were scooped with the pond water.
Fifteen nymphs of O. abbotti already starved for
24 hours were introduced into 20 L plastic tanks
filled with pond water. Fifty fry of C. gariepinus
were subsequently introduced into each tank in three
replicates. The same set up was used for fry of
O. niloticus. A mixed culture of both C. gariepinus
(25 fry) and O. niloticus (25 fry) was also set up.
Control experiment had no nymph of O. abbotti. All
experimental and control set up were replicated three
times each. The tanks were covered with mosquito
net of mesh size 0.25 cm to prevent adult mosquitoes
from depositing batches of eggs during the
experiment. Predation was counted hourly after 24
hours. The number of fry preyed by the nymphs was
recorded. In addition, the feeding behaviours of the
larvae on the fry were observed.
Data analyses: Insect species collected from earthen
pond or concrete ponds were identified, counted and
expressed as percentage and means of the total from
each pond type. The mean number of insect taxa
collected from the pond types and those from
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Int. J. Aquat. Biol. (2016) 4(5): 325-329
surrounding vegetation as well as feeding preference
treatments were compared by Analysis of Variance
(ANOVA) to determine significant differences
between them (P≤0.05).
Results
Species occurrence in pond area: Four insect orders
and six species were collected from all the fish ponds
(Table 1). The result showed that Notonecta
unifasciata had the highest occurrence with 44.59%
in earthen ponds and 54.31% in concrete ponds. The
least represented were the Dipterans and
Coleopterans.
Five species of insects were collected from all the
farms, but not at every site, while Crematogaster
herculeanus had the highest occurrence (73.17%) in
the surrounding vegetation at all the sites larvae and
adult O. abbotti and Dysticus sp. occurred both in the
ponds and in the surrounding vegetation having
widespread occurrence in all the farms.
The mean number of taxa collected in the ponds
was less than that of surrounding vegetation;
although numerically more insect species were
collected from the ponds in all the farms (Table 1).
Bombata farm having concrete ponds had the least
number of insects of the Order Lepidoptera and
Odonata. Analysis of variance reveals a significant
difference for all order of the insects collected at the
farm.
Feeding preference of O. abbotti nymphs for fry of
C. gariepinus and O. niloticus: The results showed
that nymphs of O. abbotti feed highly on fish fry of
the two fish species when introduced into the tanks.
The number of fry reduced as the period of exposure
increased. After a period of 24 hours, only 16% of
the C. gariepinus and 32% of O. niloticus remained
in the experimental tanks relative to the control.
In the mixed culture, it was observed that the
nymphs exhibited a preferential feeding, consuming
more C. gariepinus than O. niloticus. At the end of
24 hours all the C. gariepinus introduced had been
consumed by O. abbotti nymphs while 45% of the
O. niloticus fry remained. Comparison of feeding
preference of O. abbotti on fry of O. niloticus and C.
gariepinus and control shows that the feeding rate of
O. abbotti was significantly higher (P≤0.05) in the
experiment than in the control.
Discussion
The objectives of this study were to evaluate the
diversity of insect species found in the ponds and
vegetation of three farms in Ojo and Badagry areas
of Lagos State and to test if O. abbotti actually select
its prey while feeding on fish fry. The ponds and fish
farm are breeding grounds for a wide diversity of
insect species, while some insects lay their eggs on
the water surface, others find the ponds as an
excellent feeding ground, feeding on larvae of other
insects and even fish fry. Man-made ponds attracts a
wide array of insect species, selection of the pond as
Insect Orders Species
Ponds Surrounding
Vegetation (%) Earthen (%) Concrete (%)
Hemiptera Notonecta unifasciata 44.59 54.31 -
Gerris remigis 35.06 26.72 -
Odonata Orthetrum abbotti 12.12 12.09 2.79
Coleoptera Dysticus marginalis 4.76 2.59 4.58
Diptera Aedes aegypti 3.46 4.31
Lepidoptera Acentria niveus - - 4.88
Hymenoptera Crematogaster herculeanis - - 73.17
Orthoptera Catantops melanosticum - - 8.80
Zonocerus variegetus - - 2.00
Homoptera Hermetia illucens - - 3.88
Table 1. Insects collected from ponds and surrounding vegetation.
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Denloye et al./ Occurrence of Orththrum abbotti and intraguild predation in Lagos fish farms
a preferred habitat by such insects cannot be
unconnected with the fact that it provides for them a
wide variety of food sources and effective breeding
ground, so much that they can locate the ponds soon
after their construction.
The diversity of insects in a pond and the
vegetation around the ponds is related to the number
of available predators around. Foltz and Dodson
(2009) reported that the abundance of Notonecta
undulate, was positively correlated with shallow,
fishless ponds, while Cooks and Streams (1984),
reasoned that fish predation is an important
determinant of Notonecta habitat utilization pattern.
Another factor that determines aquatic insects’
abundance is the fish species composition in the
aquatic body. Wittwer et al. (2010) reported that the
major determinant of the dragonfly community in
Swedish lakes is its fish species composition, and
that this in turn affects the lower trophic levels,
although different fish will affect the dragonflies
population differently. The presence of vegetation
also affect the species richness of the aquatic insects,
since the vegetation covers serve as a place of refuge,
although these cannot change the level of risk among
prey species significantly (Cook and Streams, 1984).
The common belief that some aquatic insects such
as Odonates and Notonectids are general feeders can
be erroneous when considering the predatory
behavior exhibited by O. abbotti in this study. Zalom
(1978) reported that Notonectid populations
exhibited cannibalistic tendencies in the laboratory
with special preference to certain species of insects.
In another study by Tave et al. (2008), Dragonflies
fed selectively on black O. mossambicus as
compared to gold coloured ones when presented with
the two fishes in a 1: 10 ratio. Earlier studies have
also shown that dragonflies were more likely to
attack smaller prey than larger ones (Rashed, 2005).
The results of this study support the position that
dragonfly nymphs are predatory on fish species. In
this study, C. gariepinus and O. niloticus fry which
are generally considered to be one of the most
important tropical catfish and tilapia species
respectively were slightly larger than the O. abbotti
larvae. Although there was no significant difference
between the number of C. gariepinus and O. niloticus
fry fed upon by the dragonflies nymph, results show
that O. abbotti nymphs exhibited selective and
preferential feeding on C. gariepinus and O. niloticus
relative to the control.
The results indicate that dragonflies preyed upon
fry of test fish species. Farmers need to be equipped
with this information which shows that fry missing
in the ponds may be as a result of predation by
dragonfly nymphs. Moreover Abowei and Ukoroije
(2012) reported that it was better to have the
knowledge of the biodiversity, biology, behaviour,
roles and so on of aquatic insects to allow for
sustainable aquaculture management. The result of
this study supports that assertion.
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