The abiotic ecology of breeding ground of Palaemonid prawns in the Ilaje Estuary, Ondo State, Nigeria

In situ ecological assessment of the breeding grounds of palaemonid prawns was conducted in some selected locations around Ondo state coastal area between the months of April and September. Data obtained were subjected to both descriptive and inferential statistics. Three species of Palaemonid prawns were identified in four different locations within the study area with relative abundance ratio of 4:3:1. Macrobrachium macrobrachion, Nematopalaemon hastatus and Palaemon maculatus respectively. Sex ratio of 1 male to 5 females for M. macrobrachion, and 1 male to 2 females for N. hastatus and P. maculatus were observed with result showing significant relationships (P < 0.05) in distribution patterns across collection sites. Population distribution within the water column showed that palaemons are sub-lithoral prawns inhabiting maximum mean depth of 0.67m ± 0.025. Surface macro-phytes such as Eichhornia crassipies, Paspalum vaginatum, and Pistia stratiotes are common providing hiding spots for the prawn at the breeding ground. The mean soil pH across the sites stands at 6.67± 0.399 with the soil textural class that range from silty-loam to silty-clay. Also, the water quality parameters of study areas suggest that captive culture and rearing of Palaemons may be feasible outside the breeding areas

MODELING THE EFFECT OF TEMPERATURE ON ENVIRONMENTALLY SAFE OIL BASED DRILLING MUD USING ARTIFICIAL NEURAL NETWORK ALGORITHM

Due to increase in environmental legislation against the deposition of oil based mud on the environment, drilling companies have come up with an optimum drilling mud such as plant oil based mud with little or no aromatic content, which its waste is biodegradable. Optimum mud carry out the same function as diesel oil based drilling fluid and equally meets up with the HSE (Health, safety and environment) standard. It is expedient to determine the down hole mud properties such density in the laboratory or use of available correlation but most time; the range of data is not either reliable or unavailable. In this study, artificial neural network (ANN) was used to address the unreliable laboratory data and unavailable correlation for environmentally friendly oil based drilling mud such as jatropha and canola oil. The new artificial neural network model was developed for predicting the down hole mud density of diesel, jatropha and canola oil based drilling mud using 30 data sets. 60% of the data were used for training the network, 20% for testing, and another 20% for validation. The test results revealed that the back propagation neural network model (BPNN) showed perfect agreement with the experimental results in term of average absolute relative error returne

Capital Gains Tax on Investment, Infrastructural Facilities Provision and Gross Domestic Products in Nigeria

This paper examined the influence of Capital Gains Tax (CGT) on Investment (INV), Infrastructural Facilities Provision (IFP) and Gross Domestic Products (GDP) in Nigeria. Ex-post facto research design was adopted with data obtained from Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Statistical Bulletin and Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) tax reports, 2017. The data collected were presented in descriptive statistics and correlation analysis performed. Augmented Dickey Fuller (ADF) Unit Root test was used to ascertain the stationarity of variables, and the Johenson Co-integration trace and Eigenvalue test was used to show the long-run relationship of variables. The test of hypotheses using OLS regression models revealed that Capital Gains Tax is positively and significantly related to investment and infrastructural facilities in Nigeria. It is recommended that government should ensure that capital gains tax is properly administered, efficiently managed and accounted for, to enable the citizenry reap the benefits it confers on investments, Infrastructural facilities provision and gross domestic products in Nigeria. Keywords: Capital Gains Tax, Gross Domestic Products, Infrastructural Facilities    Provision, Investment DOI: 10.7176/JRDM/57-06 Publication date:July 31st 201

Investigating the dynamics of bank credit in Nigeria: The role of bank consolidation

This paper examines the dynamics of deposit money banks (DMB) credit and the role of consolidation in credit growth in Nigeria using vector error correction model and Granger causality test. The empirical investigation involved DMBs that have maintained a unique name and some market characteristics before and after the 2004 banking sector consolidation. Using quarterly data from 1999Q1 - 2013Q2 of the selected DMBs, the results show a positive relationship between post-consolidation credit supply growth and the real gross domestic product. The results also show that despite the onesided positive causality from credit supply to economic growth, the total contribution of the consolidated credit growth to real activity was not significant. The paper, therefore, recommends that in order to improve the credit channel of monetary policy transmission, policy makers should take into account how the banks react to such policies

The effect of Monensin vs. Neem, and moringa extracts on nutrient digestibility, growth performance, methane, and blood profile of merino lambs

DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT : The authors confirm that the data supporting the findings of this study are available within the article.Plant secondary compounds are potential rumen modifiers that can improve nutrient utilization in ruminant animals. This study evaluated the effect of Moringa (Moringa oleifera) and Neem (Azadirachta indica) leaf extracts on nutrient digestibility, growth performance, and enteric methane production in South African Mutton Merino lambs. Forty 4-month-old ram lambs with a mean body weight of 35 2.2 kg were blocked by weight and from each block, lambs were randomly allocated into one of the following treatments: (i) diet only (fed a total mixed ration TMRnegative control), (ii) Monensin (fed TMR containing Monensin sodium, 15 mg/kg DM), (iii) Moringa (fed TMR, drenched with Moringa extract 50 mg/kg feed DM intake), and (iv) Neem (fed TMR, drenched with Neem extract 50 mg/kg DM intake). Extracts were administered via oral drenching at a concentration determined based on the previous week’s feed intake. There were no differences in dry matter intake, average daily gain, feed conversion efficiency, digestibility, and nitrogen retention across the treatments. However, the extracts tended to reduce methane emitted both in g/head/day (p < 0.08) and g/ kg dry matter intake (p < 0.07). Extracts did not influence any of the blood metabolites in the ram lambs. Although the benefits of utilizing these medicinal plants as rumen modifiers under prolonged feeding conditions is justified, further evaluation is recommended to test Moringa and Neem leaf extracts at higher inclusion levels. Our research group is currently exploring a variety of phytogenic tools for the identification and standardization of key bioactive compounds linked to methane inhibition, in these leaf extracts.The National Research Foundation (NRF) South Africa.https://www.mdpi.com/journal/animalsam2024Animal and Wildlife SciencesSDG-02:Zero Hunge