Effect of vitamin C on hematological parameters of goldfish (<i>Carassius auratus</i>)

Abstract

The objective of this work was to evaluate the influence of vitamin C on hematology parameters of goldfish (Carassius auratus). A total of 80 young goldfish were used for the experiment, distributed in 10 tanks with 0.20 m³ each, installed in a circular masonry tank with 25 m³ capacity. The experimental design was completely randomized with five treatments and two replicas, each tank containing eight fishes, with initial average weight of 20.36 ± 0.30 g and 11.37 ± 0.98 cm of length, fed four times a day. The diets were composed of 32% of crude protein and 3200 kcal kg^-1 of digestible energy. The mineral and vitamin supplements were prepared in order to obtain concentrations of 0 (control), 250, 500, 1000, 2000 mg of vitamin C kg^-1 of ration. For blood collection, the fish were anesthetized with benzocaine (75 mg L^-1). We analyzed the following parameters: hemoglobin tax, percentage of hematocrit, erythrocytes count, hematrimetrics index, total leucocytes count, trombocytes and differential leucocytes analyses. It was found that the vitamin C levels in diets does not affect the hematological parameters.