Microbiological Examination of Three Types of Common Edible Marine Fishes from Visakhapatnam Fishing Harbour, East Coast of India

The present study was carried out for microbiological analysis to assess the quality of raw fish sold in the Fishing harbour of Visakhapatnam. The study was performed during the period of April 2013 to March 2014. Three commonly edible fishes were selected for the microbial analysis to evaluate the quality of fish samples in terms of microbial content, the samples were inoculated and counted using Agar plate method. The microbial count was done by Total Bacterial Count (TBC), Total coliform counts (TCC) Total faecal coli form counts (TFCC). In the fishes of Upeneus vittatus (Forsskal 1775) yellow banded goat fish, Nemipterus japonicus (Bloch, 1791) Japanese thread fin bream, Priacanthus hamrur (Forsskal 1775) crescent tail big eye fish. 10gms of fresh muscle is swabbed from the dorsal fin region was chosen as the target sample for the estimation of the microbial load. The TBC ranged from 2.39 x 104 cfu/g to 4.96x 104 cfu/g while the total coliform count was noticed to greater than 160 MPN/ g in Nemipterus japonicus, whereas the lowest count of 75 MPN/g in Upenus vittatus. The pathogenic bacteria Salmonella sps, Vibrio sps were mostly present in the collected samples. The findings of this study infer that the fish obtained from these sources contain potentially pathogenic microorganisms. Therefore the edible fishes should be properly cleaned and cooked before consumption to avoid health risks.