We collected and reared Theragra chalcogramma walleye pollock brood-stock for use in natural spawning tests and undertook to obtain domestic pollock via fertilized egg capture, development of fertilized eggs, and absorption of yolk sac after hatching. Whole pollock were caught with trammel and set nets and immediately placed in a deep-sea water tank. Adults were the most common pollock age group (43.0%; n = 86) among the 254 pollock captured in March 2014 with 57.9% (n = 147) being captured off Southern Gosung, Korea. The main spawning period of pollock is February (spawning phase of 91% of pollock). From the deep-sea tank, we collected 1640 mL of naturally fertilized eggs (~820,000 eggs) from 12 spawning events occurring between February 4 and 22 2015. The floating/ live eggs were maintained in deep-sea water tanks at 5.5 ± 0.2℃. Egg size was 1.5 ± 0.03 mm. Six hours after fertilization the eggs were at the 2 cell stage, and the eggs hatched approximately 340 hours after collection. At hatching, larval length and yolk sac area were 5.2 ± 0.25 mm and 9.5 ± 1.00 mm2 (100%), respectively. Four days after hatching, the yolk sac area was 2.2 ± 0.53 mm2 (23.1 ± 5.55%). This is the first report of collection of naturally fertilized eggs from pollock and their subsequent hatching while held in an indoor deep-sea water tank. The results suggest that such collection could assist in the recovery of pollock resources and the possibility of domestic rearing of cultivated larvae.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.