LOLA Oyster Seed VA

Disease resistant and triploid oyster brood stocks produced under license with the College of William and Mary.  Breeding work by the Aquaculture Genetics and Breeding Technology Center (ABC) at Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS).

To make the sterile, robust, fast growing triploid, male tetraploid lines are used, also created and improved at ABC, to cross with the female diploid line, which yields triploids.

Mass selection was used as the principle means to attain disease resistance, by breeding survivors. Later, larger oysters were also selected. The resulting line, LOLA was one of two foundation lines of early releases of brood stock by ABC. Now, little selective pressure is applied to LOLA, the focus is maintenance of genetic health of the line.

• A low to medium salinity stock,
• with moderate resistance to MSX
• and high tolerance to Dermo.  
• Notable for good growth performance at low salinities.  
• The ancestors of this stock come from Louisiana and have been hybridized to mid Atlantic lines.
• This stock exhibits fast growth,
• but less MSX resistance than others.

Shellfish growers have the ability to select from a number of lines that have shown their utility for various growing conditions in the mid Atlantic and similar growing environments. Finding the right one for you is ultimately a function of your specific farm conditions and grow out techniques and therefore a matter of trial and error. If you are currently using a particular line, and want to try another, try a small quantity of the new line before jumping ship. Whichever line you settle on, most people use the triploid version of it.

Seed sizes below are defined by the grading screen size on which the seed is retained, e.g. a 2mm seed is that which sits on a 2mm screen and is usually 4mm to 6mm in actual shell height.

First availability is in April for smaller seeds and May onwards for larger shells.