Title: Biocontrol against Flavobacterium psychrophilum bacteria in salmonid hatcheries (Ain GHBAL farm, Azrou-Morocco).

Biography:

Assia Kritihi, 28 years old, is a Phd student in veterinary aquaculture from  Sultan  Moulay Slimane University, Faculty of  Sciences and Techniques Beni Mellal, Morocco. She is preparing her doctorate in collaboration with Ain Aghbal salmon farm in Azrou, Morocco. Since becoming a PhD in 2014, she has presented twenty-six papers at national and international conferences and eight articles in peer-reviewed journals.

Abstract

In aquaculture hatcheries, intensification is the main source of all animal health issues in the production, especially organic. The development of commercial aquaculture in Morocco began around the year 2000, since aquaculture has become a major industry in continental areas. Intensive rainbow trout farming is by far the most important activity (Hall, 2015) . The hatching and Trout production takes place in onshore freshwater tanks, the water temperature is around 10°C to 14°C, and in addition to certain other factors it is an essential element of the bacterial disease called Bacterial Cold Water Disease (BCWD), caused by Flavobacterium psychrophilum, threatens wild salmonids and spreads around the world and causes substantial economic losses (Devlin and al., 1995). In addition to being transmitted horizontally from  infected  fish to a healthy one, Flavobaterium  psychrophilum can be transmitted from infected parents to their off spring via sexual fluids, the pathogen  could be present inside or outside the eggs and even  in the ovarian fluid,  thus promoting the negative impacts of this pathogen(Ekman  and al., 1995). In our study, we are looking for a new biocontrol agent against this pathogen taking into account the problem of the emergence of new bacterial strains resistant to antibiotics as well as the integration of exploitation in the sustainable development policy and its organic production strategy that requires the total elimination of the use of antibiotics. So we first used the actinobacteria producing active substances and we found very good results. We also tested essential oils known for their powerful antibacterial effect and the results found were very encouraging.