Y.V. Salvi, V.P. Joshi, P.S. Khanolkar, J.M. Koli, S.T. Sharangdher and M.T. Sharangdher
Abstract
Dried seer fish is high quality exportable fish. However, the fish dried by traditional method does not meet the export standards.An attempt was therefore is made present study to dry the seer fish in solar panel drier (SPD) an Solar tent drier and this fish was compared adopted by traditional method. There were least changes in the biochemical, microbiological and organoleptic characteristics of the SPD and STD dried fish and these fishes make the export quality standards, when the moisture acid insoluble ash and salt variations were taken into considerations.While in traditionally dried seer fish moisture, acid insoluble ash and salt did not meet the IS standards for export The total absence of pathogenic microbes in solar panel and solar tent dried fish indicated that the fish was dried totally underhygienic conditions. Thus both solar panel and solar tent dryers were found to be suitable for seer fish drying. However, the solar tent dryer was noted to be fragile, prone to wind action and so its life was very short, on the contrary the solar panel dryer could be used for longer period.