Diversity of bacteria in sewage treatment plant used as fish culture pond in southern Ghana

Abstract

Bacterial populations from different stages of sewage treatment ponds in Ghana have been found to consist essentially of the same bacterial species, but the predominant species varied with each system. Subtyping of the bacterial strains recovered from the different ponds, and comparing the species present was a valuable tool in determining correlations between the flora of the different environments. The results indicated that the diversity among the bacteria populations from the sewage treatment ponds was generally high, with mean diversity above 0.95 in each pond. Twenty-five species of bacteria were identified as associated with the fish culture systems in this study. The identified bacteria included one genus of spiral and curved bacteria, Campylobacter sp., one genus of Gram-negative aerobic rod, Pseudomonas sp., 16 genera of Gram-negative facultative anaerobic rods, Actinobacillus sp., Aeromonas sp., Citrobacter sp., Edwardsiella sp., Enterobacter sp., Escherichia sp., Flavobacterium sp., Hafnia sp., Klebsiella sp., Pasteurella sp., Proteus sp., Salmonella sp., Serratia sp., Shigella sp., Vibrio sp. and Yersinia sp., one Gram-negative anaerobic bacterium, Bacteroides sp., three Gram-positive cocci, Micrococcus sp., Staphylococcus sp. and Streptococcus sp., two endospore-forming rods, Bacillus sp. and Clostridium sp., and one Actinomycete, Corynebacterium sp.