Are you considering raising Hybrid Tilapia? This is why I won't consider it!

This comment is aimed specifically at the Tilapia that are either de-sexed using drugs or chemicals, or those using the so-called “Supermale.” This is not aimed at hybrids of pure strain O.Aurea, O.Nilotica, O.Mossambicus, or O. Hornorum. If you are raising them commercially to sell, that's your lookout, but if you're raising them to feed to your own family, I'd do some research on them if I were you! If you buy hybrids, make sure they come from pure strain stock!

First off, I wouldn't want to put something in my mouth, nevertheless my stomach that might have been a female, but was chemically altered to make it a male. That kind of hybridizing just leads to problems, diseases, malformations, or chemical imbalances 20 or 30 years down the road. That's why we've got illnesses like Alzheimers (aluminum cooking utensils), GMO foods (cancers, allergies), Brucellosis (Mad Cow disease) now proven to cause brain disease in humans ...... etc., etc., etc.. I have found some research on the chemicals used (Synthetic Steroids, Androgens, such as MT, hormones, Human and Simian (ape and monkey) viruses, mixed with alcohol, fish oil, or Vegetable oil, but how long do they stay in the fish's body, and can they eventually build up in the body of the humans that eat them? I haven't been able to find any research that answers that question ! Over 95% of all*Tilapia today are raised for commercial food production, and*are usually*either genetically or chemically altered to produce the faster growing males,*PLUS they*are normally fed diets that often contain hormones and dangerous chemicals.

And how do they reverse the sex chemically? Here's a couple of quotes:

“The most commonly used synthetic estrogens for sex reversal are the non-steroidal estrogens, ethynylestradiol (EE) and diethylstibestrol (DES). DES is the more potent and once was used as a growth promotant in livestock until banned by the US Food and Drug Administration in 1979. Both are carcinogens. ”

Let's see, the FDA bans it for livestock, then allows it for the fish we're going to eat ..... how does that work?

Then, of course, there's the “fry bath” where the fry are dipped once or twice in testosterone, mestanalone, or estrogen for a period so that they can reverse the sex of the fry.....

“Bath treatments with estrogens have not successfully defeminized tilapia. Rosenstein and Hulata (1993) treated O. mossambicus with 17alpha-methyltestosterone over a range of concentrations and durations with no effect on the sex ratios. Toxicity is an issue in estrogen treatments. Eckstein and Spira (1965) reported high mortality of O. aureus fry when given stilbestrol diphosphate baths at 400–1000 :g/l. ”

Of course, the food suppliers want to help out the growers, so they provide the treated feeds and good advice ......

“Since male Tilapia grow faster than females, it is advisable to use an all male population. Many Tilapia growers purchase all male sex-reversed Tilapia from fingerling producers who specialize in sex-reversal. - Purina Mills”


The “Supermale” Hybrid.
I found some research on this that was very interesting. The problem with the super male is that the offspring, which do grow rapidly, are a very inferior fish and successive generations* produce*poorer and poorer quality fish and breeding colonies must be constantly replaced. One thing you will rarely be told about offspring from these "Super Males" is that to*achieve the rapid growth, the large-scale food producers must feed diets supplemented with hormones such as testosterone and/or cancer causing chemicals that we end up eating!

A Cuban research paper has shown what is used to produce these “Supermales” ......
“ tiGH - The Tilapia Growth hormone gene cassette for Tilapia, Oreochromis hornorum hybrids is made up of : P: Human Cytomegalovirus G: Tilapia growth hormone cDNA and T: Simian virus 40 poly A site

tiGH - (1)The Tilapia Growth Hormone gene cassette for Tilapia, Oreochromis niloticus hybrids is made up of: P: Ocean pout antifreeze protein G: Chinook salmon growth hormone cDNA T: Ocean pout antifreeze protein 3' region

tiGH - (2)The Tilapia Growth Hormone gene cassette for Tilapia, Oreochromis niloticus hybrids is made up of: P: Tilapia L18 ribosomal protein promoter G: Tilapia growth hormone gene T: Tilapia poly (A) and termination signal

From the book, Genetically engineered food by Knut Heller:”

"Growth is a complex process in fish. This study was designed to test the effect of different levels of recombinant tilapia growth hormone (tiGH) injected intraperitoneally in juvenile hybrid tilapia Oreochromis hornorum. Tilapia GH cDNA was cloned from hybrid O. hornorum tilapia. The mature protein was expressed in E. coli under regulation of the phage T7 promoter. The E. coli-derived tiGH was partially purified to 67% purity and, following renaturation, was shown to be biologically active in in vivo and in vitro assays. Recombinant tiGH stimulated extracellular matrix synthesis as shown by 35S-sulfate uptake in ceratobranchial cartilage explants. Zero, 0.1, 0.5 and 2.5 &#55g tiGH/g body weight (gbw) were injected in tilapia, and the effects on the growth-promoting action, hepatosomatic index (HSI), and mRNA insulin-like growth factor (IGF) induction were measured. A significant increase in the body weight (P < 0.05) and length (P < 0.01) was observed in tilapia receiving 0.5 &#55g tiGH/gbw. However, tilapia receiving 0.1 and 2.5 &#55g tiGH/gbw did not show an increase in body weight and length with respect to the control group receiving BSA injections. Binding sites for the recombinant tiGH were identified in the liver. Consistent with its somatotropic actions, the IGF mRNA induction was observed in the groups injected with 0.1 and 0.5 &#55g tiGH/gbw (P < 0.05). No significant increase in the HSI was detected in the injected groups when compared to the control group. These results demonstrated that the injection of biologically active E. coli-derived tiGH produces physiological changes in juvenile tilapia that ultimately resulted in a growth-promoting action only at a dose of 0.5 &#55g tiGH/gbw. - Journal of Marine Biotechnology, Vol. 6, No. 3. (1 August 1998), pp. 142-151."

Now I don't know about you, but I'm really not into the idea of having Human virus' and monkey virus' put into my food - talk about monkey pus and turkey turds, this stuff doesn't sound good at all . Then to clean this witches brew, they purify it in E.Coli – I'm confused, I thought E.Coli wasn't a good thing!