Does the gastrointestinal tract serve as the infectious route of Aeromonas hydrophila in crucian carp (Carassius carassius)?

Under experimental challenges, the gastrointestinal (GI) tract of fish has been proposed as an infectious route of several pathogenic bacteria. Is this also the case for diseased fishponds? A field research was conducted to verify this hypothesis. A crucian carp (Carassius carassius) reared fishpond with motile Aeromonas septicaemia outbreak was sampled in this study. A total of 62 strains of Aeromonas hydrophila were isolated and identified. The clonal relationship among these strains was determined by sequencing the gyrB gene, ERIC-PCR, RAPD-PCR, and the presence of seven virulence genes. Strains with identical genotypes were further confirmed as the same clone by multilocus sequence typing analysis. Experimental infection assays were also conducted in zebrafish (Danio rerio). The results show that the same clone strains identical to those in the blood of diseased fish existed in the intestinal digesta of diseased and uninfected fish. Regardless of their origins, all these strains were highly pathogenic to zebrafish. The result indicates that pathogenic strains of A. hydrophila had existed in the GI tract of fish before the infection occurred. This increases our knowledge on infectious route of A. hydrophila in crucian carp.