Electroejaculation efficiency of male morphotypes of the freshwater prawn Macrobrachium rosenbergii

The objective of this work was to evaluate the electroejaculation applicability for artificial insemination as well as the ejaculatory potential of each Macrobrachium rosenbergii adult male morphotype. Electrical stimuli were applied to 48 newly pond-reared individuals of freshwater prawn for a better comprehension of each one's reproductive behavior: the blue claw males (BC), sexually active and dominant; the orange claw (OC), sexually inactive, and the small ones (SM), with opportunist behavior, succeeding to copulate only if a BC male has made the courtship first. There was no difference among the ejaculation frequencies for OC and BC males, which were 85 and 100%, respectively, demonstrating that the former morphotype has physiological potential for mating. The frequency of 46.2% of successful electroejaculation tests observed for SM individuals was lower in relation to the two other morphotypes. The frequency of 79.2% of ejaculations observed for all used animals demonstrated the technique potential for the attainment of a sufficient amount of spermatophores prior to the maintenance of gravid females during cold temperature seasons.