Artificial Reproduction and Embryogeny of the Tiger Frog Hoplobatrachus occipitalis (Gu¨nther 1858)

Abstract

The objective of this study was to investigate the embryonic development of the frog Hoplobatrachus occipitalis after their artificial reproduction with the Ovaprim, a combination of gonadotropin releasing hormone analogue and dopamine antagonist domperidone. Male and female H. occipitalis were collected from the wild and were intramuscularly injected with Ovaprim at doses of 6 lL/g and 8 lL/g body weight, respectively. The eggs were laid 6 h after hormone injection. The numbers of eggs laid by each female frog were 1726 ± 5.4 (SD) with 94.4% and 88.2% mean fecundity and hatching rate, respectively. The diameter of the eggs at laying was 2.73 ± 0.33 mm while it was 5.04 ± 0.05 mm just before hatching. The stages of embryonic development starting from fertilization to tadpoles’ formation took 27 h to complete at 26.4 ± 0.3 C. The average height of the tadpoles after hatching was 5.1 mm. Circular tadpole movement in the chorion with an irregular respiratory movement was observed at 21 h after egg-laying. In summary, the study shows that H. occipitalis could reproduce in controlled environment by hormonal induction; the reproductive structures have no significant effect on egglaying; and the embryonic development time of H. occipitalis differs from that other Anuran species.