STUDIES ON LENGTH-WEIGHT, WIDTH-WEIGHT RELATIONSHIPS AND CONDITION FACTORS OF Sudanonautes africanus (MILNE-EDWARDS, 1883) COLLECTED FROM THE EMBANKMENT OF OSUN RIVER, AT IKERE EKITI IN NIGERIA

This research was performed to determine the length-weight, width-weight relationships and condition factors in male and female of freshwater crab; Sudanonautes africanus collected from the embankment of Osun river, at Ikere Ekiti in Ekiti State of Nigeria. From the collections made, the females were more abundant (63%) than males (37%). In all the relationships determined, positive linear relationship was recorded for both sexes and the overall analysis of all the relationships determined for each sex revealed that the regression coefficients ‘b’ were not distinct between the sexes with positive allometric patterns identified for both males and females (b>3 in all). However, there were variations in the correlation tests among the variables between the sexes and the males showed higher condition factors in all the parameters measured. This study has shown that Sudanonautes africanus could be very suitable for commercial crab culture.