ILAR Journal Online, Volume 37(4) 1995: Fish, Amphibians, and Reptiles

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ILAR Journal V37(4) 1995
Fish, Amphibians, and Reptiles

Introduction
Richard C. Van Sluyters

While the rodent is still the traditional laboratory animal, studies with fish, amphibians, and reptiles are on the increase. Lizards as environmental sentinels; antifreeze-like molecules in antarctic fish; clinical applications of snake venom anticoagulants; DNA manipulations in frog oocytes; catching, marking, and release of freshwater aquatic species in environmental sciences laboratory courses; and zebra fish as indicators of pesticide toxicology are but a few examples of contemporary research and teaching involving what the 1996 edition of the Institute of Laboratory Animal Resources (ILAR) Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (NRC 1996) conveniently refers to as "nontraditional species." Indeed, what were once considered relatively uncommon nonmammalian species are now almost as likely to be used in research and teaching as more traditional species like Xenopus laevis (African clawed frog) and Carassius auratus (goldfish). While this expanded use of nontraditional species has led to exciting new research discoveries and innovative laboratory courses, it has also brought with it a number of special challenges for institutional animal care and use programs.

The enormous variety of life forms, unusual natural histories, mysterious behaviors, and critical needs of these nontraditional vertebrate species conspire to make it a formidable task for institutional animal care and use committees (IACUCs) and attending veterinarians to fulfill their responsibilities in reviewing and approving the associated animal use protocols. Not infrequently, these complexities are further compounded by the need to work with these animals in the wild. Field work raises additional concerns regarding the proposed methods for trapping, handling, marking, releasing, holding, and euthanizing animals that are sometimes quite exotic. There are simply too many variables of anatomy, physiology, behavior, husbandry, venomousness, toxicity, and other special considerations for it to be reasonable to expect both the IACUC members and the attending veterinarian to be well versed on all species.

Acknowledging this situation, the 1996 ILAR Guide, while directing the reader to a bibliography of selected sources of information, also states,

Guide

Like our colleagues who drafted the 1996 Guide, the editors of ILAR Journal recognize the need for concise, readily accessible, contemporary information about the care and use of nontraditional vertebrate animals. As chair of the IACUC at an institution where exotic animals are commonly used in both the laboratory and the field, I know firsthand how important it is to be able to determine whether critical information is available for a particular species and, if so, how it can be obtained quickly.

This issue of ILAR Journal is designed to provide researchers, instructors, IACUC members, attending veterinarians, and other laboratory animal medicine specialists with a series of peer-reviewed articles written by experts in the care and use of three broad categories of nontraditional species: fish (by L.J. DeTolla and others), amphibians (by D. DeNardo), and reptiles (by H.W. Greene). As they prepared their manuscripts, we asked these authors to do the following:

Define and describe the applicable species;
Comment on availability and possible sources; · Summarize applicable animal welfare laws, regulations, standards, and policies;
Describe how to develop appropriate procedures for housing, husbandry, and breeding in various settings, including references to any published protocols or guidelines;
Summarize any unusual safety considerations, such as the need for care during live feeding procedures, handling venomous or toxic species, and possible zoonotic diseases;
Give examples of the use of these species in research;
Review methods for analgesia, anesthesia, and euthanasia, including references to any published protocols or recommendations; and
Suggest how to facilitate IACUC review of animal use protocols using these species.

The result is what my fellow editors and I believe to be three excellent articles, each of which provides a wealth of information about the relevant species. Taken together, they offer some 100 citations to the broad and rapidly growing literature in this area.

These three review articles are joined by a timely, well-referenced critique of the use of hypothermia for anesthesia in reptiles and amphibia (by B.J. Martin). Under the "Issues for IACUCs" department is a contribution from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Office for Protection from Research Risks (OPRR), "Use of Electronic Communications for IACUC Functions" (by N. Garnett and S. Potkay). An "Animal Models" article, which presents an excellent analysis of alarming trends for the future costs of chimpanzees (by B. Dyke and others), rounds out this issue.

The editors of ILAR Journal are very grateful to our colleagues who so generously and expertly responded to our solicitations for contributions to this issue. We are pleased that through their efforts ILAR is able to present so much high quality information on the care and use of nontraditional vertebrate species in this single issue. We hope that our readers will find it a useful and instructive resource that merits a place on the bookshelf among the family of ILAR publications upon which we depend so much.