Investigation of morphological predictors of fillet and carcass yield in European sea bass (Dicentrarchus labrax) for application in selective breeding

We estimated phenotypic predictors for processing yields in the European sea bass and estimated their genetic variation and correlations with the traits to predict. This is important to be able to apply indirect selection for processing yields in this species. This showed that although the traits of interest were hardly correlated, it was not possible to find external predictors having a significant positive impacts on both traits (carcass and fillet yield) simultaneously. This highlights the need to study specifically these issues in different species and conditions, as the picture here is very different to the well studied case of rainbow trout for example.