Effect of smoking on the microbial quality of African river prawn

Abstract

The effect of smoking on the microbial quality of Macrobrachium vollenhovenii bought from Yanga Market, Oredo L.G.A., Benin City, Edo State was studied. The bacteria mean count ranged between 2.6 x 10⁵± 0.4 cfu/g and 8.0×10⁶ ± 2.0 cfu/g while the fungi mean count ranged between 1.2 ×10⁵± 0.4 cfu/g and 6.6×10⁵± 0.3 cfu/g. Significant differences (P<0.05) were observed in the bacteria and fungi mean count between the fresh (control) samples and the smoked samples with storage time. Forty-two (42) microbial isolates were identified as bacteria, fungi and yeast. The most frequently isolated bacteria identified was Proteus sp. 4(9.2%), followed by Micrococcus sp., Klebsiella sp. 3(6.9%), Staphylococcus aureus, Escherichia coli 2(4.6%), Pseudomonas sp., Enterococcus sp., Staphylococcus epidermis, Staphylococcus sp and Bacillus sp. 1(2.3%) respectively. While the most frequently isolated fungi was identified as Penicillium oxalicum 4(9.2%) followed by Mucor sp., Geotrichum sp., Neurospora sp., Aspergillus flavus 2(4.6%), Mucor mucido, Penicillium italicum, Botrytis, Penicillium sp., Aspergillus tamari, Rhodotorula sp., Chaonosphora sp., Rhizopus sp., Trichoderma sp. 1 (2.3%) and Yeast Saccharomyces sp1 (2.3%). The number of fungi isolates 22 (52.4%) was higher than that of bacteria isolates 20 (47.6%) in the prawn samples. The product exceeded the acceptable standard limit recommended by ICMSF and also the micro-organisms identified in this study could pose high health risk to human.