Crossing wild with set strains

[Oxquo]

I am curious to see what people think of crossing set strains back with wild fish. Example is this, I have a red snakeskin male discus and a blue turquoise female, they have laid many eggs, have had free swimming fry up to 10 days with them and then gobbled up the fry. lately the fry get eaten apon hatch. I have pulled the male, and the female at alternate times with no luck and when I do save a few eggs which is seldom, I've yet to have success with rearing them although odds with 2 fry are slim to begin with. My thought is to cross the parents with wild green Tefe and see if leaving the fry with the wild parents who should care for the fry will work. If so, I expect about a 25% to 25% to 50% ratio with the fry or atleast I would hope. The problem is that I don't believe obviously that their fry would breed true after that. This to me is not hybridizing as all of the fish are of discus strain. Has anyone done this before? No method of rearing discus fry seems to work as good as the parents caring for them but I am just interested in input.

[RD.]

IMO mixing strains is fine, as long as those fry never leave your personal tanks.

I'll admit I know squat about Discus, but once a strain is mixed it takes some serious effort (and a number of tanks) to 'fix' the features you want in the successive hatches of fry via line breeding.

As an example, breeding an electric yellow lab to a half white/half yellow lab wouldn't throw hybrids, but you would never know what kind of fry the parents would have down the road. Someone could end up with some of the 'normal' looking yellow labs, breed them, and end up with a number of half white/half yellow labs.

Personally I don't think it's a good idea to mix strains when breeding.

[Oxquo]

Interesting enough, but line breeding is how they got all the funky discus. According to Jack Wattley there is only three true wild discus, yet all our varieties come from these. I guess it would be the same to say that you should never cross a wild guppy to a tank raised strain? This is where I see confusion. Or the fact that the parents I have now are blue turquoise and red snakeskin. My question is that, since it was line breeding that got these fish to the point they are in, and in my opinion line breeding is not so genetically healthy, is bringing wild genetics back in bad. I find your view very interesting but see it as impossible then to create a genetically sound fish using line bred fish no matter where the source is from seeing that most sources start from the same place, thanks for the input...some food for thought.

[ace99]

If possible, you should keep the strains pure. That way, whoever has their hands on the fish will know what strain it is that they're getting. Besides, what would you call these discus.

I'm not opposed to line breeding for specific desired characteristics as long as the fish are true to their "strain" when they are being sold. I have purchased many juvenile ruby red juveniles that have turned out more yellow (not even orange) than red. Very disappointing.

However, I also have noticed the difficulty of breeding fish that have been line bred. Albino eureka reds are the worst. Not only are they line bred for their color, they're also line bred for the albino trait.

Just my opinion.

[RD.]

Line breeding shouldn't affect the overall health & vigor of your fish, as long as you don't 'inbreed' the line too much. Inbreeding too many generations in a row can sometimes cause some serious defects, but line breeding is commonly used by advanced breeders to fix certain traits. Line breeding, which is breeding the same strain but not brother to sister, simply fixes the desirable traits, and slowly eliminates the nondesirable traits.

Here's an interesting read on genetics, and inbreeding.

http://www.cichlid-forum.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=25161

[Oxquo]

Good point Rd but sadly, line breeding often consists of 3x bred to family then one with new member then back 3x to family. Line breeding could be done as I have past done with several tanks. A male A female, B male B female, etc... Till you get A male C female etc. Or fry from AB female to fry from CC male. This takes a tonne of room Money from selling fish will very seldom be recovered even in this manner, do it for the love of the species and or the hobby or don't do it I always say. You have a much better chance at getting rich buying stocks blindfolded.

[dunl]

Oxquo, hope this helps...this way, instead of letting the parents eat them upon hatch, hatch the eggs yourself and raise from there.

This would eliminate the need to interbreed the two lines.

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A short simple method of raising discus fry artificially

by Jeff Leach

I just thought I'd pass on something I was told by a discus breeder in Chicago recently regarding artificial rearing of fry. I personally have never tried this, but the man who explained it to me raised most of his fry this way, and he had about 35 pairs of discus and a great deal of success. He starts by removing the eggs from the parents (his pairs laid on a variety of surfaces including slate, pvc, and strips of stainless steel) and placing the eggs in a one gallon jar containing straight R.O. water at the same temperature as his tanks. To this he adds 2 drops of Meth. blue and aerates it slightly. Two days after the eggs hatch, he fills a white bowl with clean tap water (He stressed that white is important) and uses a turkey baster to wash the eggs from the slate into the bowl. After they become free swimming and most are swimming up to the top, he adds a pinch of O.S.I. artemia food (I don't recall exactly what it is, but it's the stuff that you would feed to brine shrimp.) He also starts feeding the smallest of newly hatched brine shrimp at this time with an eye dropper. His methods are simple, and he uses household materials to strain the shrimp. He siphons the newly hatched shrimp into a slightly worn linen handkerchief with a catch basin underneath. the shrimp that are collected in the handkerchief are fed to larger fry. The water that has passed through the handkerchief is then poured through a strainer lined with a bounty paper towel. (He stressed BOUNTY at this point) The shrimp that are trapped by the paper towel are the ones that get fed to the newly hatched fry. He actually showed me the process, and he had it down to where after pouring the water through the strainer with the paper towel liner, there was just enough liquid in the catch basin to leave about 1/2" above the center of the paper towel. He could then use the eye dropper to suck up the shrimp and feed them to the discus fry. He feeds the pinch of artemia food and shrimp to the newborn fish three times a day, at 7:00am,1:00pm, and again at 7:00pm. He does not feed anything after 7:00pm to any of his fish. He also claimed that there were batches of fry that he raised with only two feedings per day. He continues this method for about 5 days and then switches over to just brine shrimp until they are large enough to take other foods.

[Oxquo]

thanks I may give that a try, I have tried a few methods with limited success.

[dunl]

What have you tried so far, and what problems have you had?

[Oxquo]

Raising the fry with both parents, just mom, just dad, alone in hatchery, even in the hatchery the hatchout seems a bit poor, which is why I wonder about the parents. At this point I am not concerned about keeping a solid strain as I mentioned I have a F blue turquoise and a M red snakeskin. I kinda just wanted the practice on artificial rearing now that I have these two, What I really want is wild green tefe fry which after all this hassle I may have just started with them. Bad part about discus is sexing, even at maturity you can't until they spawn or get ready to. Too bad the stores can't pre-sex them for ya even if it costs more atleast I wouldn't be stuck buying 10 fish. As for foods, I have used Sera 1, golden pearls and BBS. different articles suggest different things.

[dunl]

How about this article?

Raising Discus from a Beginner's Perspective

[dpaul]

very few strains of discus breed true...many times you'll get a percentage of turqs from just about everything...for example leopard snakeskins:when you see a picture of an award winning spotted fish, if you bred two of those together you'd be lucky to get 10% that are even close to as nice as the parents...

If you want to breed your fish with some wild fish, go for it...as you said, they're all discus-it's not like you're spawning another one of those monsters like jelly bean cichlids...

p.s. I've found if you can leave the fry with the parents, their chances are much better...especially if you can't be there to feed 5 times a day..

[Oxquo]

Well recently they had a fry swimming around with them for 5 days. That is the longest ever. 1 fry isn't really worth saving but it was a good sign I hope. I have heard that raising them up in tap water has way better results so I intend on trying it if future fry make it atleast 7 days with the folks. A friend of mine has just had his blue turquoise spawn in tapwater conditions although they ate the fry at wiggler stage I may be able to get a few free blue turquoise from him in the near future.