Although many advances have beenmade during the rapid growth of thecatfish industry, today’s culture practicesare about the same as those developedover 25 years ago.

Most catfish is processed into fresh or frozen fillets and whole-dressed fish. Other products include steaks, nuggets and value-added products, which accounted for 21 percent of the total products sold in1998.

The domestic crawfish industry isthe only large-scale, commercially viable crustacean aquaculture industry in North America. With more than 110,000 acresof crawfish ponds, Louisiana’s 1,600 farmers produce 35 million to 50 million pounds annually worth $25 million to$35 million at the producer level.

Geneticists develop maps of DNA molecules to aid in understanding inheritance patterns.One kind of map, called agenetic linkage map, describes inheritanceof observable traits, such as color or shape, and usually involves breeding studiesto compare parents and offspring.

Crawfish aquaculture in Louisianadepends solely on a forage-based foodsystem for supplying nutrients to thegrowing animals. Because of availableplant residue following grain harvestsand because rice exhibits good regrowth characteristics, crawfish production often follows the rice harvest as a common crop rotation practice

The preferred way to cook crawfishis to boil the whole animal in seasonedwater and then serve it so the consumerextracts the abdominal muscle, or tailmeat, by hand.

Although Louisiana already has adiverse aquaculture industry, many morespecies could be grown here or grown ona larger scale. Many prospects present specific problems that could complicate commercial development, but most of these constraints relate to marketing, financing or regulatory considerations, not technical issues.

Two serious problems affecting Louisiana aquaculture arethe bacterial pathogens that cause enteric septicemia of catfish(ESC) and photobacteriosis in hybrid striped bass. ESC causes theloss of millions of dollars annually in the catfish industry.

In much of aquaculture, animals arein high density production systems. Thiscan result in stress from crowding andsub-optimal water quality conditions andprovide for easy transmission of disease.In response to anticipated disease

When a gene from one species of plant or animal is inserted in to the genome of another species, the resulting plant or animal is then transgenic.