Growing Population of Crayfish Has One Female Ancestor

[Judi Lynn]

The new species reproduces by cloning itself and is entirely female.



A genome study has proven that all specimen of marbled crayfish originate from a single female. About 30 years ago, the original clone evolved in an aquarium.
PHOTOGRAPH BY FRANK LYKO, BKFZ
By Sarah Gibbens
PUBLISHED FEBRUARY 6, 2018

It all began with one female.

A slough crayfish was fished from the Everglades in the U.S. and taken to an insect fair in 1995 where a hobbyist bought it. Then, for reasons unknown, that slough crayfish became a new species called a marbled crayfish (Procambarus virginalis) after it began reproducing asexually, essentially cloning itself.

Unable to care for the rapidly increasing offspring, the original owner took them to pet shops where other hobby aquarium keepers bought them. Since then, the world has been invaded by that one crayfish's daughters. "That one animal founded the whole species, and now we have billions worldwide," says Wolfgang Stein, a neuroscientist at Illinois State University. He and a team of researchers recently sequenced the genome of this new, marbled species and published their find in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution.
It added to a study published in 2003 that found the species essentially reproduced through cloning, a process called parthenogenesis.

More:
https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2018/02/marbled-crayfish-marmorkrebs-evolution-genes-tumors-spd/