Angel Fish.

[a.i.m]

Ive got around 13 young angel fish which are growing rapidly, they are all from the same parents.

Q1: Once they reach sexual maturity will they start to pair off?

Q2: If they do start to pair off is it safe?, ie brothers and sisters interbreeding.

Many Thanks.

 

[IMCL85]

I dont think thats a problem in fish world. Alot of the local breeder kept fish they breed and then make more and more breeding tank. After a few generation they will start introduce fish they bought from else where and put it with there young one and start to get pair from that to prevent genus problem they will be having. And interbreeding happen too much in guppy etc. You cant really avoid if you buy them from one breeder. But it should not be a seriouse problem for the first few generation as long the one that breed out isn't reuse over and over for breeding then there should not be much problem. Good luck to ya.

 

[sylvia]

Just to explain things a little more. When you in-breed (anything) the danger is that the offspring will show some of the bad traits their parents carry but you cannot see.

You see, certain characteristics are recessive - which means you need 2 of the same gene for it to show up - if both parents have 1 copy of the gene, they won't show the characteristic but their offspring have a high chance of inheriting a copy of the gene from each parent. As they then have 2, the characteristic shows in them.

Because brothers and sisters come from the same parents, their genetics are usualy quite similar. As such, even if they don't show it, they are likely to all carry 1 gene for the theoretical characteristic. As such, breeding the siblings together is more likely to produce offspring that actualy show the characteristic as explained (sort of) above.

The 'characteristic' could be both good or bad. The problem is, obviously, when it's bad. You'll notice, for example, that many fancy guppy strains (guppies being extremely inbred) have a much shorter lifespan and are considerably less hardy than their wild-type equivalents. But, at the same time, these are the fish with the best coloring and that breed true. breeders in-breed and line-breed fish in an attempt to get these colors and patterns that breed true but there's the side effect of also passing on genes that code for bad things like a weaker immune system (strictly speaking it's a little more complex but you get the idea).

As your angels would already be inbred to some extent (did you buy their parents at once? they were probably siblings as well), their offspring are also somewhat inbred and, when they breed with each other now, their offspring will be even more inbred. However, you probably won't be seeing a major difference in the first generation. An indication would be the number of deformities you get. It shouldn't be much higher (if at all) than for the spawn that produced these 13 fish.


So basicaly, the second question's answer is, don't worry about it and don't worry to much about what I wrote above either (excuse all that rambling).

As for the first question, yes, they'll pair up. Fish don't care if their spawning with their relatives.