Evidence for genetic purity of captive and domestic striped bass broodstocks

Abstract

The culture of striped bass or its hybrids is currently one of the fastest growing segments of aquaculture in the United States. Although this industry is still in the early stages of development, it is already estimated that cultured striped bass and hybrids exceed that of the wild harvest. One major problem limiting the growth of the industry is the dependency on wild brood stock for seed supply. The Crane Aquaculture Facility (CAF) maintains the largest Chesapeake Bay (Maryland, USA) population of captive (F 1) and domestic (F 2 or greater) striped bass. These striped bass originated from wild populations of Chesapeake Bay where hybrids of Morone exist sympatrically, and where evidence of introgressive hybridization among Morone has occurred. Given this evidence, we felt it was imperative to screen all of the CAF stock for genetic purity before selective breeding efforts were initiated. We utilized genomic DNA techniques to validate genetic purity because of the ease of sampling and the high level of sensitivity to introgessive hybridization. No white bass alleles were found among the samples tested. Thus, white bass alleles if present at all are extremely rare in the CAF striped bass stocks.