Abstract
Mortalities of up to 60% farmed rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) were recorded in six floating cages farms in the Lake Titicaca during the wet season (December to April) of 2018. Fish presented uni or bilateral exophthalmia, ocular hemorrhages and melanosis. Necropsy showed severe hemorrhage in swim bladder, brain, liver and muscle, splenomegaly, and gut congestion. Histology revealed retrobulbar hemorrhage with macrophage infiltration, multifocal necrosis in several tissues, meningitis, splenitis, epicarditis, and congestion. After microbiological culture in blood agar, flat and circular colonies with smooth edges and a zone of α-hemolysis were observed. The presence of Weissella ceti was confirmed through biochemical and molecular analysis (16S rRNA gene sequence analysis), without differences between Peruvian isolates. Worldwide, W. ceti isolates from rainbow trout were similar using 16S rRNA gene sequence, however, showed discrepancies between those isolates from different hosts. Finally, Koch's postulate was confirmed with experimental infections using rainbow trouts (~9 cm) infected intraperitoneally (0.1 mL of 104 CFU). After 21 days, clinical signs and lesions similar to the recorded in natural outbreaks were observed, cumulative mortality rate was 90% and bacteria was successfully recovered from both moribund and survivor fish. This is the first report and description of weissellosis caused by Weissella ceti isolated from rainbow trout cultured in Lake Titicaca, Peru and it is the first report of the primary isolation of this bacterium on TSA and TYES media instead of TSAB medium.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 735608 |
| Journal | Aquaculture |
| Volume | 529 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - 15 Dec 2020 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:The authors would like to thank Dr. Jeffrey Hinshaw from the Department of Applied Ecology of North Carolina State University for the carefully review of this manuscript and the researchers Glicerio Amaro, Ernesto Jujra and Cesar Gamarra from the Continental laboratory of IMARPE – Puno for the support and logistic assistance during the course of this study. This work was funded by “ Ministerio de la Producción – IMARPE – Perú – PpR-2018 – Meta 03 ”.
Funding Information:
The authors would like to thank Dr. Jeffrey Hinshaw from the Department of Applied Ecology of North Carolina State University for the carefully review of this manuscript and the researchers Glicerio Amaro, Ernesto Jujra and Cesar Gamarra from the Continental laboratory of IMARPE ? Puno for the support and logistic assistance during the course of this study. This work was funded by ?Ministerio de la Producci?n ? IMARPE ? Per? ? PpR-2018 ? Meta 03?. Marco Medina: Conceptualization and data curation. Carla Fernandez-Espinel: Formal analysis (pathological assays). Giovanna Sotil: Formal analysis (molecular assays). Jefferson Yunis-Aguinaga: Writing. Violeta Flores-Dominick: Supervision and Funding acquisition. The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020
Keywords
- Histopathology
- Lake Titicaca
- Molecular analysis
- Oncorhynchus mykiss
- Weissellosis