Should we have our own club fish?

I've always thought about breeding bettas or guppies and creating something different through selective breeding. But I do t have the tanks, room, time, or financial means to support it on my own. But what if several members were to join together and help each other out? Let's say we all agree on what characteristics we want to achieve. Then select some quality breeders to start with. Once the eggs hatch, disperse the babies among our members to increase the chances of at least one batch surviving to adulthood. Then hold voting contests to select the next pair to continue breeding with. This way we increase the chances of the strain surviving. No one will need a fish room with dozens of tanks to support them. And this would be a neat project that everyone could participate in.

Let's hear your thoughts about this. What species should we start with? Please include all the species that you would like to participate in. Once everyone has had a chance speak up, we can then decide on the species and then discuss what the goals are. If there's enough interests in several species, there's no reason we couldn't have several species going at once. I'm interested bettas and guppies as an easy short term project, but would also be interested in angels and discus as long term projects. Only problem with discus is funding the endevor. I could buy a high quality stock guppy myself but discus are out of my budget unless several members were willing to invest.

My future breeding program was something like this at first since I got no response, I just decided to go solo. In order for you to keep discus you need a lot of space and they can get very expensive very fast. The fish that I plan on breeding are as follows-

1. Angelfish. (still need few more angels variety)
2. Plecos. (already working on stock)
3. Guppies. (dont have any left but plan on getting solid color)
4. Bettas. (looking around for some nice bettas)
5. Shrimp. (just patiently waiting for more Crystal red shrimp too expensive )

The best way we can acquire results is teaming up on breeding projects so we can get results faster. We still need to come up with proper guide lines, so that the members that join know what they are getting them self into because it is a big commitment that you can't give up on until you get the results you desire. Some knowledge of breeding is necessary and good fish keeping husbandry is required. I'm sure we can all agree that some level of research is required to breed any type of animal and this is no exception. I'm not trying to scare anyone just that this things does require a lot of time.

This sounds AWESOME! I would love to do Angels (of COURSE I WOULD!! LOL) Or Glofish with all "donations" going to an animal charity (patented fish..can not "sell").
I've already done guppies.......and Bettas (WAAAAY to much work! EACH fry requires an individual cup!!)
So where would the space be, how would we decide who does what...(it's pricey to roll out batches of fry until you get your desired strain). I'm in a temp house right now while ours is being built but will be able to expand again once we move.
I've always wanted to try Killifish.......anyone??

Amp2020 wrote:
Let's hear your thoughts about this. What species should we start with? Please include all the species that you would like to participate in. Once everyone has had a chance speak up, we can then decide on the species and then discuss what the goals are. If there's enough interests in several species, there's no reason we couldn't have several species going at once. I'm interested bettas and guppies as an easy short term project, but would also be interested in angels and discus as long term projects. Only problem with discus is funding the endevor. I could buy a high quality stock guppy myself but discus are out of my budget unless several members were willing to invest.

An interesting idea. Not really your typical fish club, but something where you can accomplish more as a group.

Guppies are popular for a reason. Definitely start with a high quality strain if you are interested in breeding them.

With a lot of fish the challenge isn't so much the breeding, but the raising and distributing offspring. For a selective bred fish you probably will need a fry predator for those that don't meet the standards. For a natural form, you want to only pull out what you can raise.

While you can accomplish more with breeding in a fish room, if you pick the species correctly it doesn't take 10+ tanks to have a good amount of breeding going on. Also when fish are small, you can be very flexible with your definition of a fish tank - if you have a small heater or a room with tropical temps. Also the Marina external breeder boxes are great for increasing your capacity for fry.

I think you can do angels with 3 tanks. 1 for adults(55 would be nice, but not required). 20 high for breeding pair. A fry raising tank(a 29 would be nice). You probably also need something that will eat your culls. The big thing for breeding angels is having an outlet for your young fish.

Guppies I think 4 tanks is good(but they can be pretty small). 1 for breeding, 1 for young fry, 1 male juvies, 1 female juvies.

Some fish like BN plecos can be raised along side the parents. You won't get a ton of survivors or great growth, but you will definitely get offspring if they are breeding. A nice thing about BNs is they can be kept with pretty much anything. I breed BNs and Red Cherry shrimp in the same tank.

Great suggestion verbal just wanted to point out something very important. When you are selectively breeding for a particular trait you need to grow out few offspring to adulthood before you can select the best of the best offspring. At the same time you have to be very strict with culling otherwise the strain might not progress every generation.  A little tank space is required is what I'm getting at. On a side note verbal is the guy who I got shrimp from before they exploded in my tank.

Verb/Neo... after our Monday meeting I picked Ira's brain once again about his Angel breeding operation back in the days when he was shipping well over 100 market size (Body size of a quarter) weekly. Input from another pretty good breeder, Dox, and here is what I've garnered as a basic Angel breeding operation set-up.

To start with, a number of 20G High's for the breeding action followed by a number of 2.5 - 5G tanks for egg hatching... It's assumed you'll have a number of varieties you'll be working with. Once the eggs hatch and they become free-swimmers, you'll need to transfer them to a fry tank.. say a 20-29... In a couple of weeks, as soon as they assume the standard Angel shape, versus looking like guppies, you need to transfer them to a grow-out tank(s) that will provide a gallon of water per fish. This grow-out tank will, within a couple of months, take them to market size (again, that quarter-coin size)... The adult non-breeders could be kept in a community tank but I'd think you'd want to isolate the adults by variety and pull your breeders from those tanks.
Additionally, as I understand, one of the better fry foods will be newly hatched brine shrimp. 24 hrs is the prime longevity of the newly hatched shrimp so you'll be running at least 2 batches at a time.
Now here is where I think it'd get even trickier.. I think we all can accept that to secure a gender mix, it's best to buy a minimum of six fish per variety... Of course you can just purchase breeders that you've managed to eye-ball, but costs constraints would be a big factor there so I'm assuming you'd purchase that market size I previously referred to. That six pack would pretty much guarantee a gender mix but would do nothing to ensure high quality specimens... So maybe double or triple that quantity and expect to grow them out to breeder size, hoping you've snagged some notable specimens.. With Angels I try to allocate at least 7 gallons per adult fish... I've read that 10G is better but that's what I provide for Discus so I pared that down a tad. Given all that.. say 12 of each variety, at minimum would be a 75 gallon tank with 12 juvies per tank taking them up to breeding size/age. What you do with the fish that don't meet your criteria for breeding is something else...
So, for a single variety? One or two 20G Highs for your selected breeders to do their stuff. A pair of 2-5G egg hatching tanks. A pair or more of 29's for fry rearing, a pair of 75's for grow-outs!~ Plus say a 55's for the adult community tank.
This could be 100% off base but it'll sure generate some dialog! Bill

You can eliminate a lot of small tanks with a 1 gallon rearing kit(the one I brought to your place with fries in it). Here is how I would do it. Once the breeder is put into a 20 high and they have been laying eggs. This is what i would do. This is based on the assumptions you have free swimmers.


1. Put the wriggles into that 1 gallon jar until they have angel shape. While feeding BBs two times a day at least.
2. Second if you placed the rearing kit into 29 gallon already you can just let the fry out without having to worry about moving them.
3. Start culling at this age.
4. Pristine water condition is a must so water changes is required as often as possible.
5. Once they are quarter size move the ones you want to grow out to be a potential breeder. The bigger the tank the better I would say at least 40 breeder.
6. After they are breeding size select the ones you want to breed and put them into a tank so they can pair up. Sell the rest since you can't keep all of them.

BBs hatchery and good water condition should be a must and proper diet. I didn't want to mention artificial hatching but for simplicities sake lets not worry about it. Bill I would love to pick iras brains for some Pleco breeding guide since I can't find anything about bristelnose genetics.

Fry Shouldn't stay in a 1gal for much more than hatching and becoming free swimmers.....this will hinder the shape and growth of your young fish. from the hatch jar to a 2-5 gal...then to 10 and so on.
So..to sum up...Angels may not be the best choice given all factors here. Guppies are easily crossed...easily reared..and space isn't a huge hurdle. The problem is...not too many hobbyists are in the market for them. We would be playing the "circle of life" quite a bit for an experiment. Where would the outlet be for overflow of the "unchosen"?

A couple of big ol Tiger Oscars should do the trick for culling! (Yet another 55G to house them!)
Dox... the quick removal/transfer of the free-swimmers is dead on... .As you stated, cramping will hinder the growth and have an effect on shape....A lot of folks think that the size of a fish holding container heavily influences it's ultimate size... What isn't thought of too often is that it's true that the skeletal structure will be stunted, the organs will grow to standard size resulting in a short-lived fish... Another theory that's widely accepted that if there is any point in a fishes initial life where it's "elbow room" is limited, that ground can never be recovered. Final note... I'm going to set up a new topic and transfer this whole post to "Breeding Operations Theory". Bill

re glofish from wikipedia.

However, the GloFish Fluorescent Fish License states "Intentional breeding and/or any sale, barter, or trade, of any offspring of GloFish fluorescent ornamental fish is strictly prohibited."[8]

so you can't even intentionally breed them.

Kat....shhhhhh....LOL

Bill...thanks for the move.....having trouble staying on topic. LOL

Admin wrote:Kat....shhhhhh....LOL

the shhhh is kinda killed if it's posted as a plan and discussed on the internet.

was just kidding sunshine... just kidding... Sorry my humor doesn't travel in text! Bill

williemcd wrote:was just kidding sunshine... just kidding... Sorry my humor doesn't travel in text!  Bill

Na, I got it, sorry, mood way off tonight. Should probably not post til it improves.

Doxiemom wrote:Fry Shouldn't stay in a 1gal for much more than hatching and becoming free swimmers.....this will hinder the shape and growth of your young fish. from the hatch jar to a 2-5 gal...then to 10 and so on.
So..to sum up...Angels may not be the best choice given all factors here. Guppies are easily crossed...easily reared..and space isn't a huge hurdle. The problem is...not too many hobbyists are in the market for them. We would be playing the "circle of life" quite a bit for an experiment. Where would the outlet be for overflow of the "unchosen"?

cull guppies could come to me

That's what fishy friends are for!... We take the situation as a bad day....Nothing to sweat....

I think everyone here agrees that Angels takes a little more space then guppes right??? So, my question here is should we do small live bearers and shrimp because of our limited space???

Neo.. I think it would be safe to say that a number of members will pursue their interests and engage in a breeding effort that suits themselves. ... Dox with her Angels, Ira with his Angels, Pleco's, Cory's etc. Me with my Angels and relentless effort with Discus...

Some clubs have what they call Breeders Award Programs or something of the sort. Think about setting one of them up on here!
Me personally, keep and try to breed fish that I like watching and hold my interest. I'd receive no satisfaction in seeing how many different types of fish I can encourage to breed but some folks do pursue those types of pursuits... Different strokes and all that...

Just my 2 cents.... Discounted to less than one! <grin> Bill

My goal is to breed fish and use them to study genetics. Seems like a lot of the genetics is not understood properly by the fish local keepers unless you are hardcore. My goal is to bring things into light based on what I have learned on genetics.

@Bill I will breed angels solo and other things that co exist with angels. But it's always nice to breed in a groups so we can accomplish a lot more then an individual. I'm still trying to understand what is the point of this thread??? Pardon my ignorance but I feel I'm walking in circle.

Neo.. I'm not trying to be Mr. Negative or rain on the parade or anything but rather will be in full support of that joint breeding operation... Amp and you seem really committed towards that endeavor and I, and I'm sure others, will do all that's possible to support that effort... Just let me know what I can do... and how you plan on setting the joint breeding operation up! That's where I'mconfused... Are ya suggesting fish "sleep-overs"? LOL>.. Bill

Lol...I was just asking where we were going with this..I think Amp can help here since he brought up the suggestion. I'm sure he will be come up with a better joint program then me. I usually post based on people's participation and not sure where I'm heading in this thread lol.

Anik... Neo... With over 40 years as a consultant of sorts, I've developed a trait of looking at all sides of an issue in hope of solidifying a concept or finding holes in the idea(s)... That's what I was paid to do!.. The idea of breeding to learn about genetics has been done extensively within confines that are far more well-funded versus that our meager little group could duplicate. If you want to see a sample of what has been done on Angelfish genetics, check out this link: http://www.mellowaquatics.com/Genetics_ep_45.html
or this link at Angels Plus: http://www.angelsplus.com/ArticleGenetics.htm

IMHO, a more realistic and accomplishable pursuit (Join the crowd) would be the development of a new variety/strain of a particular specie of fish within the freshwater fishes... However, Discus take approximately 18 months from fry to breeding age, some pleco's take up to 2 years... (Ask Ira about his L-183's)...
Given that you'd need 3,4,5,6,7 or more generations if everything went well each generation, with no set-backs, it becomes obvious it's not a "summer project" to develop a identifiable variety...

Another pursuit could be the implementation of the Breeders Program much like Raleigh Aquarium Society has set up... I haven't a clue as to how they over-see it, but give em a shout out if your interested!

My suggestion would be for you and Amp set up a little committee, extend invitations for all to join in to "brain-storm" the concept and develop an implementation plan.... Then present it to the members for feed-back and final fine tuning... It's hard to get folks to join an endeavor when it's not defined versus a nebulus "breeding operation". I can host a "meeting of the minds" or join ya if you'd like!

All the stuff about genetics is out there I already know but not everyone will go out of there way to go read unless they were a nerd like me. You only mentioned the few source that got most of their stuff from Dr. Joanne Norton article about angelfish breeding. There is also more new mutation coming out every year and no one has complied all the new stuff into one that is easier to understand. The new blue gene (pb) is work of Mr. Ken; where he saw the potential of the platinum angelfish and made new type of angelfish like the pinoy for example. The Bulgarian seal point(Bsp) angelfish is still under development and not much is known about them. Raiko is the breeder and he is doing a fine job of keeping a record of his crosses so that we can understand the heredity of this new mutation. I know the information is out there but I want to use this forum to keep a record of what I have learned through searching forums and my own little experiments. Also giving proper credit to those that actually took their time to share their knowledge.

Edit- Don't forget I'm a biology student....I might know not seem like it but I know a few things...I just don't write very good but learning to get better .