This study aimed to understand the dietary composition, relative gut length and foraging intensity of immature and mature of male and female B. boddarti during the dry and the wet seasons, that will contribute to our knowledge on food and feeding habit of other goby fishes in the monsoonal regions. | TAP CHI SINH HOC 2015, Dinh37(2): Minh252-257 Quang DOI: A PRELIMINARY STUDY ON DIETARY COMPOSITION, FEEDING ACTIVITY AND FULLNESS INDEX OF Boleophthalmus boddarti IN MEKONG DELTA, VIETNAM Dinh Minh Quang Can Tho University, dmquang@ ABSTRACT: The mudskipper Boleophthalmus boddarti (Pallas, 1770) is an important commercial fish, but information on its dietary composition has been limited. This study was carried out from March 2013 to February 2014, in Tran De, Soc Trang, Mekong Delta, Vietnam to understand its food, foraging intensity and fullness index. A total of 120 fish specimens including 63 females (8-15 cm in TL) and 57 males ( cm in TL) were collected and analysed. The results showed that the sex ratio of B. boddarti was close to 1:1 and this mudskipper would be a herbivorous fish due to high relative gut length value (RGL>1) based on 120 gastrointestinal tract length analysis. Among them, 75 fish stomachs were used for food item determination. The B. boddarti fed mainly on Bacillariophyta (), and detritus was also composed in its stomach contents (). The mudskipper showed high in foraging intensity due to high fullness index value. The variation of food composition of this fish depended on season, but not in gender and fish size. The results provided useful information on diet composition of B. boddarti and contributed to our knowledge for other gobies living in the monsoonal regions. Keywords: Mudskipper, herbivorous, food items, feeding intensity, fullness index. INTRODUCTION Information on interactions of fish in the aquatic systems is obtained from knowledge on food and feeding habits of fish [6, 13, 18, 23] that provides a key to select suitable fishes for aquaculture [3, 19]. Feeding activity of fish varies with numerous factors, such as the amount of precipitation and the availability of food organism composition [19, 23]. Information on stomach contents is associated with the food .
