Selective breeding is the process by which humans use animal breeding and plant breeding to selectively develop particular phenotypic traits (characteristics) by choosing which typically animal or plant males and females will sexually reproduce and have offspring together. Domesticated animals are known as breeds, normally bred by a professional breeder, while domesticated plants are known as varieties, cultigens, cultivars, or breeds. Two purebred animals of different breeds produce a crossbreed, and crossbred plants are called hybrids. Flowers, vegetables and fruit-trees may be bred by amateurs and commercial or non-commercial professionals: major crops are usually the provenance of the professionals.
Bivalvia, in previous centuries referred to as the Lamellibranchiata and Pelecypoda, is a class of marine and freshwater molluscs that have laterally compressed bodies enclosed by a shell consisting of two hinged parts. As a group, bivalves have no head and they lack some usual molluscan organs, like the radula and the odontophore. The class includes the clams, oysters, cockles, mussels, scallops, and numerous other families that live in saltwater, as well as a number of families that live in freshwater. The majority are filter feeders. The gills have evolved into ctenidia, specialised organs for feeding and breathing. Most bivalves bury themselves in sediment, where they are relatively safe from predation. Others lie on the sea floor or attach themselves to rocks or other hard surfaces. Some bivalves, such as the scallops and file shells, can swim. Shipworms bore into wood, clay, or stone and live inside these substances.
The Ostreidae, the true oysters, include most species of molluscs commonly consumed as oysters. Pearl oysters are not true oysters, and belong to the order Pteriida.
Pinctada is a genus of saltwater oysters, marine bivalve mollusks in the family Pteriidae. These pearl oysters have a strong inner shell layer composed of nacre, also known as "mother of pearl".
Broodstock, or broodfish, are a group of mature individuals used in aquaculture for breeding purposes. Broodstock can be a population of animals maintained in captivity as a source of replacement for, or enhancement of, seed and fry numbers. These are generally kept in ponds or tanks in which environmental conditions such as photoperiod, temperature and pH are controlled. Such populations often undergo conditioning to ensure maximum fry output. Broodstock can also be sourced from wild populations where they are harvested and held in maturation tanks before their seed is collected for grow-out to market size or the juveniles returned to the sea to supplement natural populations. This method, however, is subject to environmental conditions and can be unreliable seasonally, or annually. Broodstock management can improve seed quality and number through enhanced gonadal development and fecundity.
The Pacific oyster, Japanese oyster, or Miyagi oyster is an oyster native to the Pacific coast of Asia. It has become an introduced species in North America, Australia, Europe, and New Zealand.
Oyster farming is an aquaculture practice in which oysters are bred and raised mainly for their pearls, shells and inner organ tissue, which is eaten. Oyster farming was practiced by the ancient Romans as early as the 1st century BC on the Italian peninsula and later in Britain for export to Rome. The French oyster industry has relied on aquacultured oysters since the late 18th century.
The southern mud oyster, Australian flat oyster, native flat oyster, native mud oyster, or angasi oyster, is endemic to southern Australia, ranging from Western Australia to southeast New South Wales and around Tasmania. Ostrea angasi superficially resembles Ostrea edulis and both species may be referred to with the name "flat oyster". However, the two species do not occur naturally in the same geographic distribution.
Dicathais is a genus of predatory sea snails, marine gastropod molluscs in the family Muricidae, the rock snails. This genus is monotypic; the only species in it is Dicathais orbita, common name the white rock shell or cart-rut shell, found round the coasts of Australia and New Zealand.
Anomiidae is a family of saltwater clams, marine bivalve molluscs related to scallops and oysters, and known as anomiids. It contains seven genera.
Rock oysters are true oysters of the genus Saccostrea, belonging to the subfamily Saccostreinae of the family Ostreidae.
Marteilia is a protozoan genus of organisms that are parasites of bivalves. It causes QX disease in Sydney rock oysters and Aber disease in European flat oysters. After being infected by Marteilia, bivalves lose pigmentation in their visceral tissue, and become emaciated.
Saccostrea cucullata, the hooded oyster or Natal rock oyster, is a species of rock oyster found mainly in the Indo-Pacific Ocean.
Pinctada fucata, the Akoya pearl oyster (阿古屋貝), is a species of marine bivalve mollusk in the family Pteriidae, the pearl oysters. Some authorities classify this oyster as Pinctada fucata martensii. It is native to shallow waters in the Indo-Pacific region and is used in the culture of pearls.
Polydora is a genus of annelid worms. It contains marine polychaete species that live in mud, holes bored in rocks, and holes bored in the shells of shellfish.
Tenguella marginalba is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusc in the family Muricidae, the murex snails or rock snails. It is commonly known as the mulberry whelk and is found in shallow waters in the Indo-Pacific and around the north and east coasts of Australia.
Saccostrea echinata, commonly known as the tropical black-lip rock oyster, blacklip rock oyster, blacklip oyster, and spiny rock oyster, is one of several tropical rock oyster species, occurring in tropical seas across the Indo-Pacific, including coastal waters across northern Australia to Noumea.
Theodore Cleveland Roughley (1888—1961) was an Australian zoologist, author, and public servant. He is best known for his work on the Sydney Rock Oyster and its commercial cultivation, and for his books and other publications, mainly on marine science, which he skillfully illustrated with his own artwork and photography. In the later part of his career, as Superintendent of Fisheries, he implemented measures for the scientific management of fisheries in New South Wales, including catch size limits and closures of certain waters to commercial fishing. He was a well-known and influential public figure in his time. He was also known informally as Ted Roughley and, as an author, T. C. Roughley.
Oyster farming on Georges River, commercial aquaculture of Sydney Rock Oysters, in the Georges River estuary of New South Wales, Australia, occurred between around 1870 and 2023. Production peaked in the 1970s. In the financial year 1976–1977, the river produced 2,563 tonnes of oysters, over a quarter of the record statewide production total of 9,375 tonnes. Following a series of setbacks after that year, an outbreak of QX disease in 1994, all but totally destroyed the industry on the Georges River; the development of QX-resistant strains came too late to save much of it. In 2023, the last oyster farm in the estuary was forced to close, and the future of the area as an oyster growing area is now uncertain.
