The studies on parasites and parasitic diseases are of great interest to fish farms, because both can affect the performance of the fish. The aim of study was to investigate the parasitic fauna and parasite-host relationship in Colossoma macropomum x Piaractus brachypomus (tambatinga) of 10 fish farms from the Amapá State, in the Amazon. Of the 503 fish examined 63.1% were parasitized, and a total of 49,299,189 parasites were collected, including Ichthyophthirius multifiliis, Piscinoodinium pillulare, Trichodina sp., Tetrahymena sp., Anacanthorus spathulatus, Linguadactyloides brinkmanni, Mymarothecium boegeri, Notozothecium janauachensis, Procamallanus (Spirocamallanus) inopinatus, Neoechinorhynchus buttnerae and Perulernaea gamitanae. Ichthyophthirius multifiliis was the dominant species, followed by P. pillulare and monogenoideans; these two parasites and P. gamitanae showed an aggregated dispersion pattern. We found a positive correlation between host length and the overall parasitic prevalence, as well as between fish size and the abundance of I. multiliis, P. pillulare, monogenoideans and P. gamitanae, but infection levels did not affect the relative condition factor of hosts. Management, low environmental quality and poor sanitary conditions of the fish farms favored the occurrence of ectoparasites, but the presence of endoparasites was due to supplying the ponds directly with water of natural water bodies. This is first report of I. multiliis, P. pillulare, Trichodina sp., Tetrahymena sp., A. spathulatus, N. janauachensis, N. buttnerae and P. (S.) inopinatus for tambatinga in Brazil.
Aggregation; culture; parasites; fish; sanity
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