Hi Tilmann and others listening in:
Glad to see that Tilmann Benfey [7 September] has picked up on the point I have been making in many written and oral communiques lately about the precedent already set, with grass carp, for certifying triploid status of every fish in a mass produced lot of embryos induced to be made triploid. When terrestrial farmers in Florida, United States, pushed to have permission to introduce grass carp, an exotic species, into the state's irrigation canals in order to control aquatic nuisance plant species clogging the canals, (many of which are also exotic species), the state government agency, the Dept of Game and Fish, in the 1980's established the requirement that each and every grass carp sold to a farmer had to have its blood cells screened and thus the fish certified to have triploid status (thus, effective sterility). Note that this is STILL required. Grass carp could wreak havoc in the Everglades and other natural aquatic ecosystems of Florida just as much in this century as in the last.
Anne Kapuscinski
Professor of Fisheries & Conservation Biology
Extension Specialist in Biotechnology and Aquaculture
Director, Institute for Social, Economic and Ecological Sustainability
(ISEES)
Dept. of Fisheries and Wildlife, University of Minnesota
200 Hodson Hall, 1980 Folwell Ave., St. Paul MN 55108, USA
Tel.612-624-7719 (ISEES), 612-624-3019 (Fisheries),
FAX 612-625-8153 (ISEES), 612-625-5299 (Fisheries)
Email: ark@fw.umn.edu
http://www.fw.umn.edu
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