A small scale laboratory study was conducted to determine the effects of salinity ranging from 15, 20, 25, 30, 35, 40, and 45 ppt on the filtration rates of juvenile oyster with 25 ppt as the control. Three juvenile oysters (shell weight: 1.04 ± 0.12 g; shell length: 1.9 ± 0.2 cm; shell height: 1.9 ± 0.1 cm) were used to test the filtration rates in each salinity over the course of 8 hours. The hourly filtration rates were determined from the exponential decrease in algal ( concentration as a function of time. The oyster in 35 ppt salinity produced the highest overall filtration rate (FR) with 134.06 ± 15.66 mL hr oyster and the lowest overall filtration rate (FR) occurred in oyster exposed to 15 ppt and 45 ppt with 31.30 ± 6.90 mL hr oyster and 32.11 ± 7.68 mL hr oyster respectively throughout the 8 hours. The result from this study can be useful for optimum oyster culturing and the oysters can be employed as a natural biofilter in marine polyculture farming.

Tetraploid induction has been conducted on temperate oysters but not on tropical oysters. In this study, different heat shocks (32, 35 and 38°C) and cold shocks (1, 4 and 7°C) were used to induce tetraploidy in two tropical oyster species, Crassostrea belcheri and Crassostrea iredalei, through meiosis I inhibition. Temperature shocks were applied on the newly fertilized eggs at 8-10 min post fertilization and terminated when second polar bodies began to form in the control eggs. The ploidy of the larvae and spat was determined via direct chromosome count. The percentage of larval survival until Day 20 was low (between 0.4% and 42.9%) for both temperature shocks and oyster species. No surviving larva was recorded for induction at 1, 4 and 38°C. Tetraploid spat was only recorded in C. iredalei but the percentage is low through heat shock induction of 32 and 35°C. This study shows that the tetraploid induction success rate was slightly higher in C. iredalei compared to C. belcheri. No surviving tetraploid spat were recorded for both oyster species through the cold shock method. This study shows that heat shock can be used to inhibit meiosis for the production of tetraploids but more experiments need to be conducted to determine the optimum temperature when dealing with tropical oysters.