7315

• UCREFRP Catalog Number: 7315
• Author: Colorado Water Conservation Board.
• Title: State of Colorado Hatchery Feasibility Study for Endangered Fishes of the Colorado River Basin, Vols. 1 & 2.
• USFW Year: 1993.
• USFW - Doc Type: \
• Copyright Material: NO

. REFERENCE NUMBER:
CITATION:

002

Ammerman. LK., and D.C. MorizoL 1989. Biochemical genetics of
endangered Colorado squawfish populations. Transactions of the
American Fisheries Society 118(4):435-440.

SPECIES AND LIFE STAGE:

CS, CS_ADU

TOPICS:

Life history, Production, Research

KEYWORDS:

GENETICS, BROOD STOCK, ELECI'ROPHORESIS

SUMMARY:

Genetic make up of two wild populations of Colorado squawfish and two hatchery stocks were
found to be very similar. One hatchery stock was derived from three females and 10 males
from a group of twenty-nine wild fish collected from the upper Colorado and lower Green
rivers in 1978 and 1979. The other hatchery stock was derived from one female and five males
from a group of eight fish collected from the Yampa River in 1973 and 1974.

.

Vertical starch gel electrophoresis was conducted on muscle, liver, fin and brain-eye tissues by
the Siciliano and Shaw (1976) method. At least 9 of 44 identified loci were polymorphic. Five
of these 9 can be identified from fin tissue which can be taken non-lethally. Heterozygosities
were high (2.6 - 5.3%), and polymorphic loci were also high (9.1 - 13.6%) as compared to a
congener (Sacramento squawfish 4.2%). The Dexter stock from the Green and Colorado rivers
bas gained an allele not detected, but probably present in low frequencies in natural
populations. Four other loci exhibited allelic variation in two or more populations. Deviation
of two loci from expected Hardy-Weinberg proportions existed in the Green River population
and suggest reduced gene tlow between localities. -Greater divergence may be seen after
several more generations of breeding in these captive populations unless such variability is
preserved by carefully designed breeding programs..

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A-2