Blood collection under anesthesia, peripheral blood cells, plasma biochemistry, and plasma protein electrophoresis in a living fossil: the Spotted Ratfish ().

This report describes the safe and effective handling under anesthesia, blood collection and main clinical pathology values determination for three adult Spotted Ratfish () (two males and one female) successfully maintained under human care for more than 20 years. The anesthetic MS-222 diluted in tamponed salt water at 50 ppm provided deep narcosis with mean induction and recovery times of 5 and 20 min, allowing safe handling and blood collection in the three animals sampled. Major leukocyte types were similar to other teleost and elasmobranch species, identifying lymphocytes as the predominant leukocyte (75.