Morphology of the digestive tract of Barbus xanthopterus and Ctenopharyngodon idella Ali J. Shubber and Abdulmotalib J. Al-Rudainy

Abstract

The aim of this study is to detected the morphology of the alimentary canal in two
freshwater fish species, Gattan Barbus xanthopterus and Grass carp Ctenopharyngodo idella
which belonged to cyprinidae.. Increasing in mouth width with body length. Generally
pharyngeal teeth arranged according to the following formulas. Gattan : 4-3-2 and 2-3-4
Grass carp: 2-5 and 4-2. Variations in the shape, size of pharyngeal teeth were noticed. They
appear short and wide compact in gattan, but hard and serrated, comb like in grass carp.
Different intestinal length were seen indicating differ in feeding natures.