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Batch or trickle: understanding the multiple spawning strategy of southern calamary, Sepioteuthis australis (Mollusca: Cephalopoda)

journal contribution
posted on 2023-05-16, 22:42 authored by Kuipers, MR, Gretta PeclGretta Pecl, Moltschaniwskyj, NA
Many cephalopods are ‘multiple spawners’; however, we know little about the timing and dynamics of egg production. This has implications for the allocation of energy to reproduction, lifetime fecundity and subsequent recruitment. The current study aimed to determine if Sepioteuthis australis (Quoy and Gaimard, 1832), which spawns multiple times, produces mature oocytes for deposition in a continuous trickle or in larger discrete batches. Throughout a spawning season, developmental stages were assigned to the ovaries of each female by combining macroscopic and histological analyses of the oocytes. Half of the females (46%) showed a significant peak in oocytes at one of the maturation stages, indicating that females were developing eggs in batches. It was hypothesised that the remaining females were also batch spawning, given that the oviductweights of the remaining females (54%)were high and the other measured biological characteristics were similar to those of the females showing a peak in oocyte stage.Average batch fecundity declined over the 3-month spawning season, but total egg numbers in the ovary increased, suggesting that females might have deposited small batches more often during December. As reproduction requires large allocations of energy, understanding how females distribute reproductive effort throughout their lives is crucial to understanding the behaviour of populations, individuals and their offspring.

History

Publication title

Marine and Freshwater Research

Volume

59

Issue

11

Pagination

987-997

ISSN

1323-1650

Department/School

Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies

Publisher

CSIRO PUBLISHING

Place of publication

Collingwood, Victoria, Australia

Rights statement

Copyright © 2008 CSIRO

Repository Status

  • Restricted

Socio-economic Objectives

Aquaculture molluscs (excl. oysters)

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