INVESTIGATIONS ON ARTIFICIAL PROPAGATION AND REVEAL REPRODUCTION FEATURES OF THE WEATHERFISH (Misgurnus fossilis) (PRELIMINARY RESULTS)
Eszter Buza*, Ferenc Demény, Béla Urbányi, Balázs Kolics, Tamás Müller
Szent István University, Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, Institute of Environmental and Landscape Management, Department of Aquaculture. 2100-Gödöllo˝, Páter K. u. 1., Hungary
Buza.Eszter@mkk.szie.hu
Abundance of the weatherfish (Misgurnus fossilis) has been decreasing from the last century mainly due to habitat destruction. It is categorized as „vulnerable” on the IUCN Red List. Systematic stockings of weatherfish into adjacent streams, canals and still waters might help to develop self-sustaining populations of M. fossilis in places where the species disappeared or occurs only sparsely. Artificial propagation and rearing of the larvae may help in strengthening population considerably, thus re-population of decreased stocks and creating new habitats – suitable for demand of the species – shall be possible.
Weatherfish can be propagated with the same method as Cyprinus-like species in hatchery, the only difficulty is the small amount of the sperm. Several reproduction parameters (latency time, fertilisation rate, hatching rate, survival rate, etc.) and developmental factors (embryo and larva genesis depending on water temperature) were investigated.
To reveal the special asexual reproduction features of M. fossilis, stripped egg batches of weatherfish were fertilised by Crucian carp sperm (Carassius carassius) under laboratory conditions in 2009. Three larvae hatched, one of them died after two days, but two females were managed to rear to maturation phase. According to their morphology these females did not seem to be a hybrid, these are „real” weatherfishes, which indicate that M. fossilis has similar reproduction strategy to Prussian carp (C. gibelio), that may refer to its ability to propagate asexually. However, it has to be proved by genetical investigations. A reared female was propagated again and crossing resulted in 8 viable offsprings by weatherfish sperm. Our final aim is to determine the ploidity of and capability of hybridisation of both the maternal fishes and their offspring gained via sexual and asexual propagation. These results are under completion.
Acknowledgements The study has been supported by the NTP project number TECH_09-A3-2009-0235 provided by the National Innovation Office of Hungary and by the TÁMOP-4.2.2.B-10/1-2010-0011 „Development of a complex educational assistance/ support system for talented students and prospective researchers at the Szent István University”
project. Furthermore, present publication was realized with the support of the project TÁMOP-4.2.2/B-10/1-2010-0025
