Another post I came across, which I can find again if any one cares to see the specifics was a study done on hatch rate dependant on temperature and current variations.
480 (ish) hatched normally, and there were 20(ish) abnormal babies. There was no mention of how many eggs total were used, but 500 (ish) would be about the number one female could produce if I'm not mistaken. And if an experiment is going to be carried out, it would make sense to use eggs laid at the same time and from the same female.
There is a picture of the breeding adults used at the bottom of that post.
I'm sure a hormone is being used, but I would imagine the success rate would have to be higher than that by this time. From what I have been reading on there, it sounds like each province has its own "government run" facility and now farms are popping up, soley for the use of making money on the delicacy aspect of the salamanders.
It appears that the breeding has been so successful that there is discussion on that message board of cross breeding between populations to create a more disease resistance type of salamander to be used for release back in the wild. Just like any discussion here, some were quite opposed to it, while others saw the good in having a stronger strain to release.
Disclaimer- I am an overly enthusiastic idealist who hopes and looks for the best in anything, but in the same respect I'm very discerning. It is my opinion that we have not given the Chinese enough credit in their efforts of Salamander conservation, even if it is (and I don't think this is the case) for the sole purpose of capitalizing on the high price the Salamanders demand in the food markets. Even this type of effort will greatly reduce the amount of stripping adults from the wild to be utilized as food.
To me that doesn't take away from the fact that they won't release what hormone they are using, and seem to be very selfish and secretive - although I think this is more a communication barrier than anything.
To reference what I'm saying, another post on their was making a direct joke about this hormone. The title of the post was "The secret Giant Salamander spermatazoa is ********." Inside of that it appeared people continued making jokes about the fact that no one knows what it is, one poster even replied. "Human urine works best".
But hey, maybe he is right
, so I think the best thing we can do is start urinating on all of the Giant Salamanders once a week until they start producing. Or maybe a CIG representative could use the translator and go on this board to possibly talk to someone directly affiliated with the Chinese Giant Salamander "International" Research Group. They seem to be all about working together.
