When Can U Tell The Color Of Fry

[Miss Dib Dabs]

I pretty much followed that Sylvia. Talking genetics gets so bogged down and no matter how anyone words it it always ends up long winded. I enjoy the genetics too but I'm really rather new to it all. Am gonna have some fun with my bettas and their genetics soon. Have a combtail red blue butterfyl male I'm going to try with my crowntail pale blue girl. Should be interesting to see the results as I've yet to breed from either and have no clue as to their parents lines. Just waiting for him to start blowing a half decent bubble nest. He's so lazy he only blows the odd singles. The top of his tank had singles all over it until I cleaned it this morning.
The spawn between Blue and BB did fail. Not suprised since she was very scatty. He's blown another huge nest though and the tank has been cleaned and tidied (In as far as gouramies like 'tidy') so we'll just have to wait and see now.
Going back to what Sylvia was saying about lavenders (darn, wish I'd find some in a store) I believe it's a cross of a pale gold to a blue. Which would signify that both have more dominant weaker genes, if you follow me. I suspect most fry would come out wild type but some would come up lavender. Until you reach a point where you have a definite male and female lavender you cannot guarantee any. All a bit hit and miss really. Which is why the single pale fry I've had from a previous spawn will be remaining with me, whether male or female. I shall then find a suitable partner to spawn with. Judging currently I'm guessing she is female. Some of the gold fry are most definitely male. Even now their dorsal fins are elongating from the obvious females. Some are still neither here nor there.
Hugs,
P.
Edit:What do you mean by 'the things we clean the tank with'? Inside or out? Inside I only use a line of tubing suck the water through and let it go into a bucket (as opposed to my mouth). This syphons off the substrate very efficiently and is about as cheap as it gets. Takes a little practise not to suck up all the sand or gravel though.
If you mean the glass I use an aquarium magnetic cleaning thing. If you mean the outside glass I use glass cleaner. You can get ones that are harmless to fish should any accidentally get into their tank. The kind from supermarkets would be nasty to fish if it gets in.

 

[Fizban]

im not too shore on how u clean the sand or gravel .........i mean i under stand now its best not to take all the water out and put the fish in a bucket when cleaning the tank but what do u use to clean all the crap and muck left at the bottem??............oh and how much blood worms is good for them and can the fry eat them

 

[sylvia]

Small fry won't be able to eat bloodworms but the adults usualy love them. You can feed them as often as you like realy but I preffer to rotate between different foods so would only feed bloodworms about 3 times per week at most.

A gravel vacuum looks like this: http/www.aquaticeco.com/index.cfm/fuseac...id/2506/cid/698

They aren't all exactly the same - it depends on the brand.
The basic idea is that you have a wide plastic tube and a thinner length of airline tubing attached to that.
You suck on one end of the airline tubing and that starts off the syphon.
Light materials get pulled up through the wider plastc tube, along with water, and are removed from the tank.
Heavier things like gravel stay put (more or less).

If your substrate is especialy messy, it means you have to reduce your feeding and do water changes more often. However, as long as you are not over-stocked, a weekly gravel vacuum and water change are adequate for keeping your substrate and water in good condition.

 

[Fizban]

as for food i only can get blood worms fish flakes and the sinking kind of small pellets ...................oh i am curus what do u think is the meaning of life for a gourami as in why it lives and what its aim is in life and stuff like that?

 

[sylvia]

I think gouramies are lucky in that they need not worry about aims of life and so on. I very seriously doubt they ever consider their past or future and seem perfectly happy that way. Maybe there's a lesson to be learned in that.

It may be just me, but I tend to explain things based entirely in terms of biological or evolutionary factors. Even with humans, I don't think we have a real aim in life other than to fullfill the instinctive drives we have -that's the way nature enables us to survive and pass on our genes. Fair enough, that's an over-simplification, but you get the basic gist.

I don't think fish have the capacity to look forward or back very far. They can probably see a few minutes ahead and remember things they've learned (eg: what comes before they are fed - namely you approaching the tank) and verious procedural things but I don't think they've bothered considering why they exist or what their purpose is like we humans tend to do - and I say 'good for them' It's one less thing to worry about.

Unlike us humans, fish don't realy need those abilities to survive in the wild so there's little reason for them to evolve them. We, having evolved as hunter-gatherers originaly, would have needed quite a bit of inginuity and an excellent memory. Gouramies just pick off what they see/feel in front of them that looks/feels tasty (refference to their modified ventral fins in case you were wondering).

If we stray away from all that for one moment, gouramies need to grow up healthily and reproduce. I don't think they consciously consider this, but this is what they evolved to do.

I'm sure more 'evolved' fish are also more intelligent. of course that carries on to 'how do you define intelligence?' and more long debates over definitions Having said that, I don't doubt gouramies (and other fish) are quite developed. I certainly admire some of their more unique abilities and do consider them 'intelligent' on their own level.

Anyway, the point I'm making, I don't think fish spend much time pondering over the so-called 'BIG questions' of life and, as I've never felt the need to provide myself with a purpose, I feel no need to provide anything else with one either.