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The Mutant All-Female Crayfish, Which Reproduces by Cloning Itself, Is Filling Europe at Alarming Speed (atlasobscura.com)
The marbled crayfish looks much like any other freshwater crustacean. It has two claws, ten legs, and an attractive blue-brown marbled shell. Yet this six-inch creature, found in streams and lakes around the world, is far more sinister than you might expect. From a report: Its new scientific name gives a few clues: Procambarus virginalis. Every marbled crayfish, known as a marmorkreb in German, is female -- and they reproduce by cloning themselves. Frank Lyko, a biologist at the German Cancer Research Center, first heard about the marbled crayfish from a hobbyist aquarium owner, who picked up some "Texas crayfish" at a pet shop in 1995. They were strikingly large, and they laid enormous batches of eggs -- hundreds, in a single go. Soon, the New York Times reports, the hobbyist was beset with so many crayfish he was giving them away to his friends. And soon after that, marmorkrebs were showing up in pet stores upon Europe.
There was something very strange about these crayfish. They were all female, and they all laid hundreds of eggs without mating. These eggs, in turn, hatched into hundreds more females -- with each one growing up fully able to reproduce by herself. In 2003, scientists sequenced their DNA and confirmed what many owners already believed to be the case: Each baby crayfish was a clone of its mother, and they were filling Europe's fishtanks at alarming speed. Just 25 years ago, the marbled crayfish did not exist at all. Now, they can be found in the wild by the millions in Germany, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Croatia, the Ukraine, Japan, and Madagascar.
There was something very strange about these crayfish. They were all female, and they all laid hundreds of eggs without mating. These eggs, in turn, hatched into hundreds more females -- with each one growing up fully able to reproduce by herself. In 2003, scientists sequenced their DNA and confirmed what many owners already believed to be the case: Each baby crayfish was a clone of its mother, and they were filling Europe's fishtanks at alarming speed. Just 25 years ago, the marbled crayfish did not exist at all. Now, they can be found in the wild by the millions in Germany, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Croatia, the Ukraine, Japan, and Madagascar.
uh, uh, finds a way...
Grab a really big pot, and some seasoning, I'm hungry.
FYI: Madagascar and Japan are not in Europe.
Just head on down to Louisiana and pick up a batch of Cajuns from the bayou and they will have those crayfish under control in no time. Don't bother bringing in snakes or gators to control the Cajuns though, they'll eat those too.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
Wasn't there supposed to be some sort of replicative fading where the telomeres or some such got shorter over time until the clones were not viable? You mean Star Trek lied to me?
Wonder how they taste?
...Cajun Navy.
We have Tribbles.
There's a quick, easy solution to this.
How do they taste?
Nevermind, strike that.
I, for one, welcome our new crayfish overlords.
The trouble with marbled crayfish....
It's the first sign of the matriarchal utopia...
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
Where did this thing come from? It's kind of freaky that it's population is growing so quickly and exponentially. I wonder what kinds of havoc it is wrecking on local ecosystems. Was this thing man made?
I had no idea that crawfish are left-handed
This is what I was thinking. Sounds like a solution to overfishing to me.
Yeah. Cheap fast growing protein - just what an over populated World needs.
a feminist's wet dream, a world without male privilege where everyone is equal (because everyone is female and identical clones)
Maybe some of them identify as male.
This looks like a GE product to me, some company that thought that super crawfish would be commercially useful. Also look at the source, from a pet store. It is not like this started in the wild.
You can't handle the truth! - Because I don't post left all my comments get modded down, bye bye Karma.
It will be interesting to see what happens. Sexual reproduction is critical for spreading favorable genes like resistance to predators, poisons, etc. Since these are all clones they aren't going to have those advantages and sooner or later will encounter some factor that wipes them out. Apple farmers face a similar problem since each variety is a single genetic variant that is grafted onto other trees.
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
is that they got them wet and fed them during the night.
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Cajun Navy deployed. Have Hot Sauce will Travel.
You mean a species which can grow at a geometric rate, doesn't need to breed, and which is pretty much a scavenger and will eat anything?
If the 'matriarchal utopia' involved the collapse of entire ecosystems, then sure.
Otherwise, not so much. Such a species will pretty much decimate any body of water if gets into.
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What about genetic drift? How many generations of these can there be, before genetic drift causes a fatal defect? Also, are all of them, in every part of the world, still clones? Or are there more than one archetype?
Wasn't there supposed to be some sort of replicative fading where the telomeres or some such got shorter over time until the clones were not viable?
Yes : *body* cell lines have such kind of control to avoid cells replicating too much.
But eggs are formed from *germ* cell lines, which are (by Nature's "design" - as its supposed to be the way a specie reproduce) not having any replication limit.
These are not "dolly the sheep"-style clones (a body cell used to form a new clone by transfering the nucleus, and might inherit some of the replication limits of the body cell).
These are parthenogenesis-style (see christian mythology about virgin mary) clones : some how, an non-fertilized egg-cell managed to grow into a full grown individual (usually, in other species, there's some kind of bug in the "meiosis" - the process is supposed to split the normally "diploid" genome into half "haploid". The wikipedia mentions that they are "triploid" - so having triplets instead of chromosome pairs - so it's quite a big bug in the meiosis procedure).
But it is an egg cell (although a chromosomaly abnormal one) that produces the whole individual, so no telomeres problems nor any other cell division limitations.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Inquiring minds want to know. Especially if we are going to be up to our tender bits in the little pinchers soon.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
The msmash, you are very old-fashioned. A message from Ukraine.
Europe is being overrun by all-female blue mutants?
Do they look like Jennifer Lawrence?
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
"I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
It's kind of freaky that it's population is growing so quickly and exponentially.
Actually no surprise.
These are not animal that care for their offsprings.
So they tend to lay a ton of eggs in hopes that a few of them manage to survive into reproductive adulthood.
The surprise isn't the massive amount of egg. (that would be a surprise for mammals like humans. that's the normal modus operandi for crayfish)
The surprise is that without any fertilization happening, the eggs are able to hatch and grow into an adult egg-laying female.
(Wikipedia mentions the animal having some chromosomic aberration and being triploid - thus the meiosis going wrong when trying to produce egg cells)
I wonder what kinds of havoc it is wrecking on local ecosystems.
Well, given that its current ecosystem is "aquariums" : its mostly pissing off their respective owner who simply don't know what to do with all the newly hatching crayfishes.
If let out freely in the nature :
- it should have predators in the nature. Not all eggs will hatch and grow to a reproductive adult. There's a reason why the reproductive strategy of all similar animals is "lay as many eggs as possible in the hope that some survive".
The population is currently explosing only because it's happening in the sheltered environment of aquarium, with humans taking care of their pets, and not much predation.
- if too many offsprings do hatch, they'll have to eat : they'll be in competion with all other animal in the environment, and they'll be in competition with all the other offsprings.
So mostly they'll probably stave very quickly, either by being outcompeted by other animal and/or by depleting the resources in their immediate environment.
So the damage to the environment depends on how fast they'll die.
Was this thing man made?
Technically, given that it currently survives because it's living in aquariums : yes, we human have contributed a bit to it.
But no, it definitely doesn't look like something coming out of some lab.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Or otherwise resemble grendles?
Would this work for engineering students too?
...for not making an Order 66 joke! Come on, nerds!
It was just a toy
Such a species will pretty much decimate any body of water if gets into.
Yet we wouldn't have beer without yeast.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
What's wrong with a world without male privilege?
Suck the head, squeeze the tip
Apparently they're tasty. From the article in Nature:
"Julia Jones, a conservation scientist at Bangor University, UK, who first identified4 marbled crayfish in Madagascar in 20074, says that the species’ spread is due largely to their popularity as a food source. In 2009, she met a man on a bus carrying a plastic bag full of them that he planned to dump into his rice fields in the hope of creating a sustainable stock, she says.
"Stopping their spread in Madagascar will be “almost impossible”, says Lyko. Collaborators there have begun campaigns urging people not to transport them or release them into rice fields. The message is a hard sell in a country where poverty levels are high and marbled crayfish are a cheap and popular source of protein. Lyko’s colleague brought a few dozen that she had caught to a family barbecue. “This went down quite well,” he says."
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Could this be one solution towards helping overcome poverty and food shortages?
And, before the sarcastic comments on the statement that Julia Jones "first identified4 marbled crayfish in Madagascar in 20074" start-- that's slashdot stripping out formatting. The "4" should be a superscript, which refers to reference 4:
[4] Jones, J P. G. et al. Biol. Invasions 11, 1475–1482 (2009).
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Mirelurks 1.0
They aren't lobsters, they're CRAB PEOPLE!!!
Crab People,
crab people,
taste like crab,
talk like people.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
> These are parthenogenesis-style (see christian mythology about virgin mary) clones
Parthenogenesis only results in female offspring, unlike what happened with the virgin birth of Jesus.
Cloning is the most ancient form of reproduction. It's so simple and easy to implement. Sexual reproduction is much more complex, but took over for complex species because it allows individuals of a species to all differ slightly in every characteristic. When facing environmental stresses, these small differences show up as lesser or greater reproductive advantage. In a sexual species, any reproductive advantage means swift adaptation of the species to new environmental conditions.
These asexual crayfish (Procambarus sheldoni?) may be reproducing fast now, but like the Cavendish banana, they will be apt to succumb to some disease that a sexual species could adapt away from.
yup
Invasive species or parthenogenesis is noting extraordinary.
I do not think it is a human GMO experiment but a nature's one.
And Europe has been invaded by a slightly different crayfish 100+ years ago.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orconectes_limosus
It's called Parthogenesis, and there are a less than a hundred species known to do this.
Of course this is completely different from the microbial Mitosis.
The ones I've heard about are mostly island dwelling lizards, but I've only seen stuff on about a half dozen parthogenic species.
I wonder if their successful invasiveness is boosted by a lack of predators in the case of these crayfish.
They might be good for farming, if they are large enough to eat and taste good.
Well, at least until a plague strikes. That's the problem with monocultures, very prone to getting wiped out by a single plague.
Would it be possible then, to cross-breed these legitimately with near-species of crayfish, until we get variations that still carry that cloning trait, and continue cross-breeding with slightly different species of crayfish until we are able to have full-blown lobster clones? Basically.. try and play telephone with that trait to get from this species to lobster?
They fuck everything up... I mean, I like eating pussy too but Jesus...
Surely many local fish will love them as a dinner and perhaps they taste good to humans as well. My area is bombarded with exotic fish or invasive species. They are fun to catch and make a great meal as well . So why always be against invasive species?
Everything's bigger in Texas.
Constitutionally Correct
How many specimen must a female human have to eat before starting to start cloning herself without males????
the food problem :D
Now, they can be found in the wild by the millions in Germany, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Croatia, the Ukraine, Japan, and Madagascar.
The country's name in English is Ukraine. There's no "the" anymore. Look at their website for any Ukrainian embassy in an English speaking country. It was OK, although a bit unusual, to call it "the Ukraine" when it was part of the USSR, but Ukrainians don't like the use of "the Ukraine" any more. It's now just Ukraine.
1) Ethnic Russians who disagree and cite ancient, Soviet era English grammar books to justify the use of "the" can suck it.
2) Rules can be different for non-English languages such as French. But just because French uses their equivalent of "the", doesn't mean English should. Again, look at any of the country's consular websites in an English speaking country. No "the".
3) There's no articles (the, a, an) at all in the Ukrainian language (or Russian either) so you can't go there to justify the use of "the" in the name.
I hope they are good eatin.
So you're saying Jesus was nonsense?
Who knew?
Farm these crayfish up and bon appetite!
But at least they can't rape, amirite?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Problem_with_Popplers
A good solution to feeding the world???
How do they taste?
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
welcome our new crayfish clone overloards.
zosxavius photography
that is the real question ... seriously if they are tasty a high reproductive rate would be GREAT.
Mmmmhhh...
This meme is getting very old and was shit to start with. Just fuck off the lot of yez.
- Everybody else on slashdot who's not obsessed with creimer
I'd watch the fuck outta that shit!
Just a few mutations to make it out of water and coat themselves in fat and fur and you've got tribbles . . .
Make sure nobody can possess one without going to jail. Therefore we compound the problem and make it worse so the government can hire a contractor to continue to not fix the problem. This has been the bureaucratic bullshittery that has infected the human species.
Just like Asian carp, snakehead, and this case, loosen regulations and allow people with an appetite to correct the problem.
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This ought to be the very next problem we solve. The sooner we can go all-female and get rid of the predator gender, the better. We'll finally have gender equality, close the pay gap, and end sexual harassment and assault completely.
At least for the crabs, or crayfish . But that's a giant first step .
1. Why do they bread faster? Are mating preferences and rituals take so much time that regular heterosexual crayfishes are not capable to outperform them?
2.Is it possible that they are result of GMO research?
Natural selection kills weak individuals and it improves population strength via eliminating bad genetic material, but on other side very strong dominant individuals breading endlessly long with its children, grand children and so on, will seriously corrupt genetic material of the population. So death and aging is evolutionary breakthrough invented by natural selection in order to defend population against dominant species.
My point is that aging is needed for bisexual reproduction only. In case of self cloning it is unnecessary mechanism because absence of sex guarantees absence of DNA corruption of the population caused by dominant species incest with its children.
So now the point! From coding perspective aging mechanism is part of bisexual reproduction, so it should be part of DNA responsible for SEX of the individual.
I would even say that it is part of the code making FEMALE to be MALE.
So if we eliminate SEX related chromosomes we are supposed to come back to the version breading by self cloning and it should be immortal as well.
So this crayfishes could be result of laboratory experiment trying to defeat aging and death!
I wonder how they're sure it's a new species? Lots of species are capable of both sexual and asexual reproduction, and if only a single female of an invasive species with such an ability were introduced into a new environment, then obviously the entire resulting invasive population would be female - males can only be produced sexually.
So, it would seem to me that to be able to claim it as a new species they'd have to try to locate the original population, and confirm that they wouldn't/couldn't interbreed with the self-cloning females. Though I suppose if the entire species has yet to be identified, then naming it after the ability to self-clone is far from the worst option available.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
Yes, that's what matriarchies DO.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Anyone capable of critical thought?
As Dr. McCoy once said, "I'd swear these things were born pregnant."
Why isn't anybody asking the real question:are they delicious?
Lobsters are omnivores, and will scavenge detritus from the bottom. So yes, they definitely do bottom-feed.
Crayfish are also omnivores, and will eat from the bottom, capture live fish, vegetation, etc.
So really, no significant food-chain difference other than fresh or salt water. If you eat one, you might as well eat the other.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.