[Zbrafish] Boy problems....

[Burdine, Rebecca D]

Hi everyone,

We have had an interesting problem that I am hoping people might have
some insight on.

Whether we setup fish in batch breeding inserts or in individual tanks,
we get a lot of infertility.  The eggs themselves look great, they have
good color, clearly undergo cytoplasmic transport, but they aren't
fertilized.

Our females will sometime slay clutches of up to 200 eggs which 80-100%
may be unfertilized.  

This does vary a bit strain to strain (Tu is the worst, our homemade PWT
strain has the least issues).  I thought maybe something happened in the
last generation of males as they grew up, but we are seeing this in the
newest generation too (fish are 6 months to 1 year of age).  We are
seeing it in strains throughout the facility.

My assumption is that the males aren't doing their job even though they
look extremely healthy.

Does anyone have any ideas?

(Hopefully this won't come down to the lack of foot baths. 8)

Thanks,
Becky



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Rebecca D. Burdine, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Dept. of Molecular Biology
Princeton University
Washington Road Mof 433
Princeton, NJ 08544 
 
Phone: (609) 258-7515
Fax: (609) 258-1343
Email: rburdine from princeton.edu
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