Document Type

Article

Department/Program

Virginia Institute of Marine Science

Publication Date

2006

Journal

Journal Of Shellfish Research

Volume

25

Issue

2

First Page

403

Last Page

416

Abstract

Because the accumulation of inbreeding within hatchery-propagated stocks of the hard clam, Mercenaria mercenaria (Linnaeus, 1758), could result in reduced growth and survival, we studied the potential for improving performance through out-crossing among existing hatchery strains. We produced all 10 possible out-crossed combinations among 5 strains of clams as well as all 5 pure parental strains simultaneously in the hatchery and measured their size at the time of metamorphosis (the spat stage) and at the end of a nursery period in mesh bags at a single field site (the seed stage). We then planted replicate plots of all fifteen strains at five field sites in Virginia, USA encompassing the range of salinity conditions used by commercial growers, and monitored growth and survival for two growing seasons. We found significant phenotypic differences among strains at the spat and seed stage, but different strains performed best at each stage. In the field we found significant site effects, strain effects and strain-by-site interactions, but there was no evidence of negative correlations in performance among sites indicating strong trade-offs that would be problematic for selective breeding. Three different linear contrasts designed to compare out-crossed and pure strains for each parental stock, test for nonadditive genetic effects within each pairing of different parental strains, and estimate the general combining ability of parental strains reveal a complex pattern. We found both inbreeding and out-breeding depression depending on the developmental stage of the clams and the parental strain examined. Within strain crosses generally produced larger spat but smaller seed. Out-crossed progeny were generally smaller at the spat stage than the average of their parental lines but larger at the seed stage. The two best performing parental strains had significant, positive, general combining abilities, whereas this measure was negative for the two worst parental strains. In the field, inbreeding depression was restricted to lines that showed poor pure strain performance, and these strains also showed poor general combining ability, whereas strains with good pure line performance showed out-breeding depression and good general combining ability. Only the poorest performing pure parental lines showed non-additive effects when we compared each out-crossed strain to the mean of its parental strains, suggesting that heterotic effects are unlikely to be useful for selective breeding. Finally, there were significant correlations between seed measurements and field performance indicating that it may be possible, in the context of selective breeding programs, to weed out inferior strains or families early in the life cycle.

DOI

10.2983/0730-8000(2006)25[403:OACSOT]2.0.CO;2

Keywords

Mercenaria Mercenaria; Hard Clam; Northern Quahog; Breeding; Genetics; Heterosis; Inbreeding

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