inbreading discus?

[clinny_d]

i have somtimes heard people talk about, imbreading discus with each other to eradicate(cant spell) peppering or other flaws in the gentic make up.
the process i was told was, mother and father mate, then the best from that are kept. then the best of those are breed together (brother and sister) getting rid of mutations in the genetic make up. the whole process continues until the breeder is happy with the end result.

what are some peoples comments on this?

[samir]

easier to buy a fish with no peppering than spend generations breeding it out.

[clinny_d]

yeah, but spending the years breading it out could be a bit of fun dont u think?
thanks for the addvice tho samir greatly appreicated

[samir]

better to spend years creating a new strain.

[Xtreme]

ur a funny man Samir :P

[clinny_d]

cant u do both at the same time??

[samir]

why ??? you could invent the wheel again but it would be easier to buy one from your local store.

[clinny_d]

LMAO AHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHA :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
good point.

[Hassles]

Interesting topic indeed. Can we all now get down to the nitty gritty of the subject matter and make this thread really interesting :?: What are the hard and fast rules of Discus hybridisation :?: How does one embark upon the perfection of a strain :?: Where / how would one 'ideally' find suitable mating partners for such an undertaking while avoiding in-breeding :?: If you mated a blue discus with a yellow discus and by the grace of God the young were green, would you not try pairing a male and female hoping for green discus fry :?:

[samir]

a solid blue and a golden discus will not give you solid green. It will give you something like this, no God's grace is provided.
http://www.centralpets.com/critter_images/fish/freshwater_fish/FWF_0004450_20030808104101.jpg

when you cross the F1 together you'll get some solid blue and some golden. wouldn't make sense if you're working on a new colour.

[Hassles]

yes yes yes I know a Blue discus mated with a Yellow discus is not going to produce a Green discus but........with all the chat about inbreeding and all the (usually brief) opinions expressed here we're still not getting down to the real hard facts of Hybridisation and or the perfection of a strain. So I ask myself, is there any relevant posts here with regard to the thread topic ? Whats your opinion ?

My opinion ? If I bred red discus (to offer an example) I'd seek red discus bred from another source to hopefully pair with mine and fingers crossed (coz thge grace of God is no longer permissible) they would breed AND if such were realised and fry created then I'd be happy with the strain - providing (insert clause) they looked good.

[Hassles]

A further point if I may. I am here because my attitude has always been "there is nothing like learning from those who know" and I am hoping to learn from those here. My knowledge is limited BUT I do know that Discus are not the easiest fish to keep and / or breed. I have a great friend who has embarked upon breeding & recently realised success so I understand the frustrations often involved. I find it immensely annoying to read all these posts devoid of pertinent information with regard to the subject matter. Should I start a new thread ?

[Merrilyn]

By all means start a new thread Hassles.

Genetics is a very interesting and very complex subject, even more so with discus when we're not starting with the original wild strains, but strains that have been bred and cross bred since the 80's by a host of different breeders.

Unless you obtain wild caught discus, and start from the beginning, you can't be assured that your breeding stock are "pure". Fish unfortunately don't come with a pedigree, so you can never be sure if the specimen you buy is line bred for several generations or was actually a 'sport' showing up in a school of fry.

I've bred discus for the last 30 years, and from my own experience, there is no guarantee breeding two spotted fish together will give you a 100% spawn of spotted fry. Same thing holds true for red fish for instance. The Marlboro Red is a strain that has been around for a very long time, and today you will often see in shops beautifully clean marlboros with hardly any peppering on the face or body. However, breed those two 'clean' fish together, and I can guarantee you will have around 50% peppered fry.

Peppering hasn't been eliminated or bred out of pigeon blood fish, it's simply been disguised. Peppered fry are culled by the breeders, and only the clean specimens grown on and shipped to aquarium shops.

Ring Leopards, a very unique and desirable strain, often lose their rings at age 12 months, and simply become spotted fish again. You don't know if your fish will hold the rings or lose them. To my way of thinking, that's not a fixed strain. That's pot luck !

It's totally unlike breeding dogs, for instance, where if you breed a male and female fox terrier together, you will get 100% fox terrier pups (especially if they're pedigreed).

Breed two discus together, you'll definately get discus fry, but what they will turn out like, is anybody's guess.

[samir]

I find it immensely annoying to read all these posts devoid of pertinent information with regard to the subject matter.

glad to be of service. This site has all the answers http://www.discus-fish-secrets.com/



Ring Leopards, a very unique and desirable strain, often lose their rings at age 12 months, and simply become spotted fish again. You don't know if your fish will hold the rings or lose them.

Is there any way to make an educated guess ?? I recently thought one of my rings had jumped out. It hadn't, it turned into a leopard. :shock:

[Hassles]

Obviously it (hybridisation / strain perfection et al) all begins with a good mating pair. Two fish with desirable characterists and deemed suitable for breeding. Where would one, here in Australia, obtain a wild discus with which the breeder could confidently commence the process ?

[Merrilyn]

That depends on what you want to achieve.

If you're looking to improve some of the strains around, then a good place to start would be to obtain a book called Discus Catalogue by Martin Ng. It will be available from one of our online sponsors. There it shows you what fish were bred together to obtain some of the strains we have today.

Turquoise discus have been around for a very long time, and will breed true, as will Blue Diamonds and Marlboro Reds. You may like to obtain a good looking pair of either of those strains, and work to improve eye colour or finnage by culling the undesirable fish and breeding only with fish that show the desirable trait that you are looking for.

For instance, a good blue diamond should have a deep red eye and show no signs of stress bars on the body at all. Recently I'm seeing blue diamonds with yellow eyes and a dark bar right at the caudal pendicle which reduces it to a 'B' grade fish. You could work towards perfecting your own strain of red eye blue diamonds with good finnage and no bars.

You may decide to try for very round turquoise discus with high fins and deep red eye, once again, a definate challenge to the dedicated breeder.

If you want to start from the beginning, and develop your own strain, then you may choose to go for a good quality pair of wild caught brown fish. There is nothing more magnificent than a tank full of high quality browns with a lot of blue striations in the dorsal and anal fins.

Work on developing a round shape and deep red eye, and you will have enthusiasts knocking on your door wanting to purchase the offspring.

If you're really keen, have the time (around 5 to 10 years) and the resources (remember you'll need quite a few tanks to grow out the offspring before you can pick the best of the spawn for future breeding) then there are still a lot of challenges facing the dedicated breeder.

It will be at times frustrating and rewarding, but always exciting waiting for your fry to develop into that 'perfect' specimen.

[Hassles]

wild caught brown fish ? From where and from who ? Thanks for the book advice - always appreciated

[clinny_d]

heyhey
merrilyn you seem to be a very smart person, and what u were talking about is precisely the same as what i was trying to say.
i didnt really want to create a new strain, my aim was to improve as much as i could the current strains, and attempting to try and get a fairly clean fish.

is there any problem with inbreeding discus? like does it eventually break down the gentic make of the fish and cause problems?

is there a set amount of times that ur allowed to inbreed with the same fish? eg mother father, daughter father, grand daughter grand father ?

i also have a slight problem, (which is kinda of the topic), i currently have 3 discus, im not sure what sex they are but to make it more easy to work it out i will name them a,b,c.
A picks on B, but B keeps following A in what seems to be a mate. C just swims around and sometimes follows A, but A wont pick on C.

do u understand all that :lol: .
if u did could somebody tell me whats happening?
cheers clinny d

[samir]

first try breeding a normal pair and growing out the fry. when you get past that, think of improving strains.

[Merrilyn]

The thing with inbreeding, or line breeding as it's usually called, is that whilst you are doubling up on the good points of the parent fish, you are also doubling up on the bad points too.

Now, soy for instance you're looking for the best quality blue diamond that you can produce. Obviously you would start with two good specimens, as near as perfect as you can find. Maybe the male has a lot of good points, but a slight kink in the forhead, known as a saddle nose. Now in this fish, it's not very bad, just a very slight kink. The female you have chosen has no such deformity, but she does not have the deep red eye that you are aiming for.


You mate these two fish, and the resulting 100 fry are doing well. As they grow, it becomes obvious that 25 of the offspring do not have the red eye that you are looking for, so you put them aside. The remaining fry have good red eyes and are growing well. At around the 6 month mark, you notice that some of the fry take after the male, and are showing signs of that slight saddle nose. You don't want to breed from them, so you put them aside. Now, you're left with 50 fry from that batch that are growing on well, have a good red eye and a nice curved forehead.

Some of them are simply not round enough, so you must put them aside too, and some of them are not showing good finnage. Out of that batch, you're left with say, ten fish that are growing well, have a good red eye and good fins. Four of them begin to develop a dark bar right near the tail fin, that leaves you 6 possible breeders. Only two are female and 4 are male.

Now you have a choice, you can either put the daughters back to the sire, pair the siblings, or put one of the best looking males back to the dam.

Pair the siblings and you'll find that a lot more of the resultant fry will have both of the undesirable traits of the parents, but some will be better than both parents. You then take the best looking male and female from those fry and mate back to the original parents. Hopefully, you have now increased the chances of getting a better percentage of fry with all the best point of the parents, or it could all fall apart, and you find that all your fry have deformed dorsal fins !

It's a percentages game, with no guarantees.

Now you bring in an unrelated male fish to breed with your fry, and you've unfortunately added a whole new set of problems to the equation. You'll get some good fish, and some really awful fish, so then you start again with line breeding, trying to improve the strain.

Personally I wouldn't go more than three generations, maybe four, without introducing new blood for hybrid vigour, but that's going to be up to the breeder, and what he's getting in each batch.

Too many deformed fry, and you need to introduce new blood.

It's a very exciting game, but do remember that the most perfect looking pair of fish may not produce the most perfect fry.

[clinny_d]

heyhey
samir yes i know im new at discus and going to be attempting to breed them aswell.
but i would like to get a fair idea what i would be trying to breed, rather then just getting a whole heap of fish and then watching them grow, its more like a hobby art, but thank you, your knowledge of breeding is very helpful.

merrilyn thanks so much for answering the questions, i know genetics can be a complex subject but the basics are good to know to.
i currently have 3 discus (hope to god that there not all the same sex :lol: )
in which the hopeful 2 breeding pair should be my main breeding pair, then as u said, introduce a new blood line of discus later on.
i know im really taking a big leap with what im doing but, you can only learn from experience i suppose.

btw, my blue discus (sorry not sure the proper strain) is very timid and hides away in the ship all the time, would there be any particular reason for this? or is this general normal?

thanks so much for the help.

cheers clinny d