Clean Seas Tuna Begins Tuna Spawning Season Early In 2012ff
9 January 2012
Australia Source: Proactive Investors
Clean Seas Tuna (ASX: CSS) has begun spawning from its Southern Bluefin Tuna (SBT) broodstock earlier than last year’s spawn start at its specialized hatchery at Arno Bay on the Spencer Gulf, South Australia.
The earlier start, which is part of a previously announced strategy to bring spawning forward, is with a regular number of small but viable spawns in the past month, allowing the instigation of the new season’s larval rearing trials at the hatchery.
Clean Seas plans to continue spawning the tuna for as long as possible to further progress the company’s understanding of tuna juvenile production.
The ultimate target strategy for the new spawn is to advance timing and provide older, more resilient fingerlings for marine grow-out by the time ocean water temperatures begin to drop in the Autumn.
The next key stages for Clean Seas will be the spawning build for production volume and then the transfer of fingerlings for controlled grow-out trials to either sea cages or holding tanks.
In March 2011, Clean Seas announced it achieved a “world first†with the successful transfer of 149 juvenile SBT into a sea cage from the Arno Bay breeding facility.
The SBT juveniles eventually succumbed to the cold winter ocean temperatures, which in turn led to the company’s strategy of bringing forward the current spawning season and targeting the ocean transfer of the SBT fingerlings during warmer water temperatures.
