Effects of Food Supply on Fecundity in the Female Guppy, Lebistes reticulatus (Peters)

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Abstract
Three distinguishable size groups of oocytes are contained in the ovary of the viviparous poeciliid, Lebistes reticulatus[long dash] small, middle-sized, and large. At parturition some of the middlesized oocytes develop into large oocytes and subsequently, upon fertilizerion, into embryos. The number of middle-sized oocytes is then replenished from a large store of small oocytes. The effect of changes in the amount of available food on these oocytes and hence on the number of offspring was explored by an experiment involving 27 female Lebistes. Rations varying from near starvation to normal were supplied over the course of 3 consecutive parturition periods. At the end of the third period each fish had received a different combination of the 3 rations. Variations in first-period rations affected the numbers of both first -and second-period offspring. Reduced numbers of offspring and reduced large and midde-sized oocyte counts were associated with reduced rations. No significant changes in the size of young or the length of the gestation period were observed.

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