that's one beautiful fish!
Aphyosemion
- Thread starter Crispii
- Start date
DoubleDutch
Fish Gatherer
Why in godsname do we humans have the urge to breed manmade colorvariaties of several fish when we have these beautiful creatures made by Mother Nature.
My answer always gets me into trouble. But all that wild diversity fascinates me, and the gene manipulation and expression involved in high quality guppy breeding, for example, leaves me cold. I have respect for the diligence and expertise of good line breeders, but I much prefer a wild fish. It tells a story that interests me more.
I know I'm in a minority with that.
It's not just fish that people screw up with inbreeding. Virtually every domesticated animal or bird has been inbred by humans to create a better animal.
Horses were starting to be badly inbred so the show arena crowd could see extreme curves in necks and weird things throughout. That was changed some years back and the breeders agreed to produce animals that could be practical as well as pretty. That meant the horses had to be able to pull a cart and do normal day to day activities and not require surgery to fix problems that were from poor genetics.
Dogs have been totally screwed up by inbreeding. Things like pugs, king Charles spaniel and boxers used to have normal shaped faces with normal mouths and noses. But due to the *&^%$#@ in the show community, they inbred the dogs to shorten and stuff up these features so it looked better to them. Unfortunately it has ruined the life of many of those dogs whereby they need surgery to fix breathing problems caused by the short snout.
Most pet Gouldian finches can't even produce normal coloured young any more due to inbreeding for selective colour traits. Some years ago when the Gouldian finch was put on the endangered species list, the government and breeders were trying to find original wild colour forms to breed and release back into the wild. It took a lot of work just to find some brood stock that produced normal wild coloured young and these birds have been bred and released. But I have been unable to find any birds during the last 10 years that produce pure wild coloured offspring, besides the ones up north being used for the breeding project.
Then we get into fish and people breeding albino fish. One of my main irks is albino rainbowfish. Rainbowfish have some brilliant colours and yet people want to remove all that colour and replace it with cream/ white. Why?
I really don't understand having a tank of white fish when you can have the original fish with red, blue, yellow or numerous other colours on them. It just doesn't make sense.
DoubleDutch
Fish Gatherer
Only thing is albinism is a natural phenonomenon and not a direct a result of inbreeding / human interference. The strains are linebred of course.
I don't have an issue with albinos like I have with electric blue, glowfish, powder blue, sunset etc..
But there are indeed so many awesome natural colored fish.
I don't have an issue with albinos like I have with electric blue, glowfish, powder blue, sunset etc..
But there are indeed so many awesome natural colored fish.
Attachments
I think the starting point of our hobby is "pretty". Almost everyone starts with fish they find colourful.
Then, in time, we begin to diverge. The mainstream goes for ornamental fish. You establish a tank and you fill it with fish of great beauty, which you then watch and enjoy.
In time you want different fish to look at, and either you hunt for uncommon fish, or become attracted by hybrids, deformities, etc.
One stream goes for what the farms manufacture - gene spliced glo-fish, deformed balloons and bloodparrots, etc.
Another goes for the show circuit approach, with guppy and Betta standards, trade names for human designed fish, and that while range of possibilities. The fish are appreciated for their show characteristics. You get the skilled linebreeders in there. And they become a different direction altogether - active, hands on and creative.
There's the underwater cat approach, the 2 foot pet fish in the 3 foot tank.
There's the nature crew, who look at the first fish they get and are drawn into breeding. There's the club breeder, whose goal is to get rare fish, breed them and turn them over in a competitive activity, to see who can breed the most species. I fell into that for a couple of hundred species. You learn a lot about the captive keeping of fish that way, but.
You can settle on one group. Cichlids, tetras, killifish, Corydoras, the various livebearer types... There you become the person who reads papers, learns about habitats and environments, and studies fish evolution while doing what all the other groups do - watching interesting fish.
I think we all can be a bit of all groups. But the biggest gap is ornamental versus natural, and because there is a gap, we don't always understand each other when we talk on forums like this. The aquarium hobby is an umbrella - fish of all sorts, plants, aquascapes, shrimp, , one tank, a million tanks, tanks for the kids, tanks for citizen science, salt, fresh, hardwater, softwater, test kit readers, jungle explorers...
I've gradually morphed from a part time semi-commercial breeder into a guy who keeps many tanks of Aphyosemion killifish and indulges in the totally, for entertainment study of how diverse they can be. I read about habitats, compare them in my head to the livebearer habitats I've visited and fished in, daydream about COVID someday ending and my going to Africa to see the fish first hand in their habitats (the pandemic killed a planned trip). I have some rainbowfish too, because I like breeding egg laying fish, and every once in a while the old 'how many fish can I breed' kicks in and I add some oddball thing I come across. I like to keep a fish for many generations, and not just for the lifespan of one pair. I follow the debates about using home aquariums to maintain endangered and extinct species. I have fun in my own way.
If someone wants albino three headed veiltail guppies, it isn't my business. I probably will avoid the discussions. I've twice had balloon mutations show up in my killies, and I put the poor things aside and wouldn't breed them. I guess I could have made some money there, but no. I can't enjoy looking at flowerhorns, blood parrots, glo-fish et al, so generally, if I see a thread here asking, I will try to talk myself out of participating. I wouldn't sell them if I had a store, but If I had a store, I'd probably be bankrupt for that decision.
We go in a lot of directions, and we should be true to the ones that interest us. But seeking the common interests that run through them all is worth the effort.
That said, get killies.
Then, in time, we begin to diverge. The mainstream goes for ornamental fish. You establish a tank and you fill it with fish of great beauty, which you then watch and enjoy.
In time you want different fish to look at, and either you hunt for uncommon fish, or become attracted by hybrids, deformities, etc.
One stream goes for what the farms manufacture - gene spliced glo-fish, deformed balloons and bloodparrots, etc.
Another goes for the show circuit approach, with guppy and Betta standards, trade names for human designed fish, and that while range of possibilities. The fish are appreciated for their show characteristics. You get the skilled linebreeders in there. And they become a different direction altogether - active, hands on and creative.
There's the underwater cat approach, the 2 foot pet fish in the 3 foot tank.
There's the nature crew, who look at the first fish they get and are drawn into breeding. There's the club breeder, whose goal is to get rare fish, breed them and turn them over in a competitive activity, to see who can breed the most species. I fell into that for a couple of hundred species. You learn a lot about the captive keeping of fish that way, but.
You can settle on one group. Cichlids, tetras, killifish, Corydoras, the various livebearer types... There you become the person who reads papers, learns about habitats and environments, and studies fish evolution while doing what all the other groups do - watching interesting fish.
I think we all can be a bit of all groups. But the biggest gap is ornamental versus natural, and because there is a gap, we don't always understand each other when we talk on forums like this. The aquarium hobby is an umbrella - fish of all sorts, plants, aquascapes, shrimp, , one tank, a million tanks, tanks for the kids, tanks for citizen science, salt, fresh, hardwater, softwater, test kit readers, jungle explorers...
I've gradually morphed from a part time semi-commercial breeder into a guy who keeps many tanks of Aphyosemion killifish and indulges in the totally, for entertainment study of how diverse they can be. I read about habitats, compare them in my head to the livebearer habitats I've visited and fished in, daydream about COVID someday ending and my going to Africa to see the fish first hand in their habitats (the pandemic killed a planned trip). I have some rainbowfish too, because I like breeding egg laying fish, and every once in a while the old 'how many fish can I breed' kicks in and I add some oddball thing I come across. I like to keep a fish for many generations, and not just for the lifespan of one pair. I follow the debates about using home aquariums to maintain endangered and extinct species. I have fun in my own way.
If someone wants albino three headed veiltail guppies, it isn't my business. I probably will avoid the discussions. I've twice had balloon mutations show up in my killies, and I put the poor things aside and wouldn't breed them. I guess I could have made some money there, but no. I can't enjoy looking at flowerhorns, blood parrots, glo-fish et al, so generally, if I see a thread here asking, I will try to talk myself out of participating. I wouldn't sell them if I had a store, but If I had a store, I'd probably be bankrupt for that decision.
We go in a lot of directions, and we should be true to the ones that interest us. But seeking the common interests that run through them all is worth the effort.
That said, get killies.
DoubleDutch
Fish Gatherer
waiting for three headed killies hahahaha
I dont like albino cories... I mean its natural and their cool. I'm not discriminating against them, but I wouldnt want any for my tanks in the future or now.
DoubleDutch
Fish Gatherer
hahaha you're free to decide.
Where from? My LFS only has one type. Do you get them as eggs?
Ah, getting killies...
I get mine through several sources. I'm a member of one of the international killifish associations. In my case, we have none in Canada, but I am a member of the group in France. In your case, there is a British Killifish Association out there. I don't know a lot about them.
Aquabid is a pricey source for eggs (and eggs don't always hatch in spite of all the care in the world, as the mail is an unforgiving environment). But I have found some wonderful fish there - ones that arrived here as eggs. I have bought zero hatches and generous hatches. That's for gamblers.
The other option is networking if where you live has a local club that meets physically. That's where I really got started, although my first ever killies were from a pet shop. That is rare.
I found some nice killies in a shop in Bethnal Green, London, the last time I was there. The guys there said they usually had killies from local breeders, although they aren't great sellers.
I get mine through several sources. I'm a member of one of the international killifish associations. In my case, we have none in Canada, but I am a member of the group in France. In your case, there is a British Killifish Association out there. I don't know a lot about them.
Aquabid is a pricey source for eggs (and eggs don't always hatch in spite of all the care in the world, as the mail is an unforgiving environment). But I have found some wonderful fish there - ones that arrived here as eggs. I have bought zero hatches and generous hatches. That's for gamblers.
The other option is networking if where you live has a local club that meets physically. That's where I really got started, although my first ever killies were from a pet shop. That is rare.
I found some nice killies in a shop in Bethnal Green, London, the last time I was there. The guys there said they usually had killies from local breeders, although they aren't great sellers.
When I was young. I bred swordtails back to green wild type, my Girlfriend bred Canaries back to wild type green. It was kind of fun.
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