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College of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences

CFAES

Yellow Perch

Yellow Perch

Yellow Perch

One reason in particular hindering expansion of yellow perch culture has been relatively slow growth and poor seed quality of currently cultured populations of this species. Continuous research is needed to genetically improve broodstocks to substantially increase growth rate and seed quality through selective breeding. Another roadblock hindering expansion has been low survival and availability of fry and fingerlings. The survival rate of pond nursed fry is dependent on weather, and late winter storms can kill all the fry in ponds overnight. Developing the indoor culture of yellow perch has significant advantages over pond culture. Limiting this possibility has been the poor indoor survival of newly hatched fry to the stage where they are completely feed-trained. Developing strategies to increase indoor survival of larvae and fry using live feed is critical to the yellow perch industry development. Artificial feed costs have increased substantially in recent years and inhibits profit potential and thus expansion of yellow perch culture.  Effective lower cost feeds need to be developed that positively impact a producer’s bottom line by maximizing growth and reducing feed conversion ratios. 

Research focuses:

  •  Genetic improvement of yellow perch broodstock for growth.
  •  Genetic improvement of soybean diet utilization rate.
  •  SNPs discovery.
  •  Genetic diversity.
  •  Linkage mapping.
  •  QTL mapping.
  •  Genetic resource and diversity analyses.
  •  Cloning and identify important genes.
  •  Genotype by environment interaction.
  •  Selective breeding for stress resistance.
  •  Developing genetically all-female populations.
  •  Develop system(s) to enhance mass production and survival of fry.
  •  Develop strategies to increase survival of fry reared indoors.
  •  Develop alternative protein source.
  •  Improve nutritional quality and ω-3 fatty acids.
  •  Relationship of stress and fish disease.
  •  Stress response to various husbandry and environmental stressors.