Midas Cichlid asexual offspring
- Thread starter Dr. Pain 312
- Start date
Dont be butt hurt. Just messing around
female cichlid held in isolation has managed to self fertilise herself and produce offspring.
The cichlid, living at Hull University, was anexperimental cross between two species: Pundamilia pundamilia and Neochromisomnicaeruleus.
She was kept in a tank on her own, likedozens of her siblings — but despite the lack of a mate, she still managed to produce more than 40 youngsters over a two-year period.
This is known as ‘selfing’ or self fertilisation.It’s a fairly common method of reproduction among flowers and insects — but invertebrates it’s very rare.
The Mangrove killifish (Kryptolebiasmarmoratus) is one of the few speciesknown to self fertilise. It’s thought to have developed the ability as finding a mate isn’t always easy and selfing is better than notreproducing at all, despite the obvious inbreeding risks such a method poses.
The reason for the selfing in the hybrid cichlid — the only one of 80 similar hybridfemales to do so — is unclear, but it could be a genetic 'innovation' caused by the hybrid nature of the fish, due to its parents having different sex-determining genes, saythe researchers.
The fish was a mouthbrooder, and shereproduced by fertilising eggs held in her mouth with the sperm she released into the water and then sucked up.
Seventeen of the 40-odd youngsters she produced grew to adulthood. These fishwere also kept in isolation but while they were fertile, none of them exhibited thesame selfing ability. However, these offspring all suffered from what scientists call ‘inbreeding depression’ — minimal genetic diversity, which can lead to birthdefects in subsequent generations.
On dissection of the selfing female, it was found that she had developed sperm-containing tissue — a testicle of sorts — next to her normal reproductive organs.
The study was published in the journal RoyalSociety Open Science.
Posted this a while back.
The cichlid, living at Hull University, was anexperimental cross between two species: Pundamilia pundamilia and Neochromisomnicaeruleus.
She was kept in a tank on her own, likedozens of her siblings — but despite the lack of a mate, she still managed to produce more than 40 youngsters over a two-year period.
This is known as ‘selfing’ or self fertilisation.It’s a fairly common method of reproduction among flowers and insects — but invertebrates it’s very rare.
The Mangrove killifish (Kryptolebiasmarmoratus) is one of the few speciesknown to self fertilise. It’s thought to have developed the ability as finding a mate isn’t always easy and selfing is better than notreproducing at all, despite the obvious inbreeding risks such a method poses.
The reason for the selfing in the hybrid cichlid — the only one of 80 similar hybridfemales to do so — is unclear, but it could be a genetic 'innovation' caused by the hybrid nature of the fish, due to its parents having different sex-determining genes, saythe researchers.
The fish was a mouthbrooder, and shereproduced by fertilising eggs held in her mouth with the sperm she released into the water and then sucked up.
Seventeen of the 40-odd youngsters she produced grew to adulthood. These fishwere also kept in isolation but while they were fertile, none of them exhibited thesame selfing ability. However, these offspring all suffered from what scientists call ‘inbreeding depression’ — minimal genetic diversity, which can lead to birthdefects in subsequent generations.
On dissection of the selfing female, it was found that she had developed sperm-containing tissue — a testicle of sorts — next to her normal reproductive organs.
The study was published in the journal RoyalSociety Open Science.
Posted this a while back.
I'm having a hard time believing this. I'm sorry I just need a bit more proof. Then I will apologize for doubting it.
So it has happened twice now?
Do you still have the parent fish?
Can you post a picture of the parent fish? Preferably with a paper with todays date written and your user name Dr. pain 312 on it.
I'm not trying to be a jerk about it I'm just skeptical.
