Ktttk Posted June 8, 2007 Report Share Posted June 8, 2007 I have noticed that two of the fry from a spawn about 2 months ago have black patches on their body. I remember reading a thread a while back about somebody getting some fry that were like this but I'm not sure what happened to them. Anyway, I wonder what happens to the black patches as the fry grow larger. Does the patch grow proportionately larger as well? or does it stay the same size while the rest of the fry grow? or does it disappear altogether. None of the parents have any black patches on them. Well I have taken a couple of pics of the fry with these black patches and I'll try and update the pics to see how what happens as the fry develop. This little guy has a black patch on the left side of his body: And this guy looks like he has a big black eye! Kenneth Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fishy_t Posted June 8, 2007 Report Share Posted June 8, 2007 You'll naturally have to call the second one Patch :lol: I have no idea about GBA's but I'll let someone know who does and I'm sure he'll enlighten us all! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coelacanth Posted June 8, 2007 Report Share Posted June 8, 2007 one leucistic male L144 was imported to Europe from the wild and bred with a wild-colour female, and then bred back to his resulting offspring to fix the yellow form. It is not the natural colour. It is common for black or dark patches to appear randomly in broods. I would assume that the patch would stay the same as the fish grew (neither shrinking nor growing, seeing it is just a patch of pigment) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fishy_t Posted June 8, 2007 Report Share Posted June 8, 2007 Makes sense - do you think it would be possible to create a strain which has lots of patches??! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coelacanth Posted June 8, 2007 Report Share Posted June 8, 2007 don't see why not. Get two patched specimens, breed them together, breed the young together... nothing like a little inbreeding lol (although seriously, ALL GBAs are completely inbred due to the way they were produced, although on the other hand they are also crossed with bristlenoses by some silly people). Anyway, I would predict that you wouldn't be able to produce a strain with set patches -- that is, with black areas in specific places on all individuals -- they would just be randomly blotched. Just my opinion of course... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fishy_t Posted June 8, 2007 Report Share Posted June 8, 2007 Yeah fixing the patches in a position would be pretty mush impossible genetically - but a patchy fish would look pretty cool! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ktttk Posted June 8, 2007 Author Report Share Posted June 8, 2007 one leucistic male L144 was imported to Europe from the wild and bred with a wild-colour female, and then bred back to his resulting offspring to fix the yellow form. It is not the natural colour. It is common for black or dark patches to appear randomly in broods. I would assume that the patch would stay the same as the fish grew (neither shrinking nor growing, seeing it is just a patch of pigment) If i repeated this process now i.e. if I take a GBA male and breed it with a common female - then breed the resulting offspring back to the GBA male - I would get some young that are GBA? Would these GBAs therefore have some 'fresh blood' from the common female? but a patchy fish would look pretty cool! I think so too.. fingers crossed that I get a male and a female! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caserole Posted June 8, 2007 Report Share Posted June 8, 2007 GBS's are not the same species as common B/N. I have the same problem with my GBA's, only lately did I notice a pail dark patch on my females dorsal fin . What I'm doing about it is growing out some of my spawns with out black patches and choosing females to breed back to my male who is an assume fallow. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ktttk Posted June 8, 2007 Author Report Share Posted June 8, 2007 As I understand it, GBAs are the same species as common bristlenoses but carry a particular mutation which makes them yellow. They are just a different variant of the common BN, just as the albino BN is a variant of the common BN but they are all the same species. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fishboi Posted June 8, 2007 Report Share Posted June 8, 2007 yes, the patch grows as the fish grow. yes, the patch fade with age. starts when they hit around 1 just like with most pattens/color on most fish no, breeding GBA with patches dont seem to increase the chance of getting off springs with patch. i keep all my patches and breed with at least 6 together over 3 generations with not even the slight increase with offspring resulting in patches. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coelacanth Posted June 8, 2007 Report Share Posted June 8, 2007 As I understand it, GBAs are the same species as common bristlenoses but carry a particular mutation which makes them yellow. They are just a different variant of the common BN, just as the albino BN is a variant of the common BN but they are all the same species. no, GBAs and common bristlenoses are definitely NOT the same species. If they were, then GBAs wouldn't have an L number. That seems fairly obvious! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caserole Posted June 9, 2007 Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 Kttk wroteAs I understand it, GBAs are the same species as common bristlenoses but carry a particular mutation which makes them yellow. They are just a different variant of the common BN, just as the albino BN is a variant of the common BN but they are all the same species. As coelacanth said.... Sorry your understanding IS NOT CORRECT. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ktttk Posted June 9, 2007 Author Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 If they were, then GBAs wouldn't have an L number. That seems fairly obvious! Just because a pleco is assigned an L number, it doesn't necessarily mean that it is a unique species. It is only a unique species when it has been given a scientific name. The L number system at the moment has redundancies where a single species may have 2 more assigned L numbers (i.e. one for the juvenile form and one for the adult form, not realising that they are the same species). But from doing a bit more reading, I do accept that the L144 is a different species from the common ancistrus but it appears that the L144 that exists in the hobby NOW is just a variant of the common bristlenose. It is the amelanistic version which is different from the albino version - and technically should not be referred to as L144. Have a look at this link. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Faran Posted June 9, 2007 Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 Wrong wrong wrong wrong WRONG. GBAs and commons are NOT the same species. They're cousins and can interbreed (as can any ancistrus) but just because a horse and a mule can reproduce doesn't mean horse and mules are the same species, does it? I hope this clarifies your understanding but since you're on Planetcatfish already why not look up L144 and ancistrus sp3 and see if they're categorized as the same fish. What may be true for germany isn't the same as NZ. We have older purer stock as we don't have commercial fish farms mixing things up. And as far as borbi goes, if he held any merit or understanding he would know firstly that it's a geneticist and not a 'molecular biologist' that would be able to explain offspring dynamics. And of course, when they're talking about albino BNs they're talking about a whole different fish than L144. You can find pics and info of both normal and albino common BN under "ancistrus sp3". While there's problems with the L-numbers and other redundancies Planetcatfish stays up with all the current info and discoveries and lists and clarifies any confusion over this. They still clearly differentiate the GBAs and albino/regular ancistrus sp3, so that settles that. So here's a question for you - the fry pictured above. Are they from 2 GBAs or a cross breeding? This looks a lot like someone crossed the line somewhere as mine have little to no patches at all, and I own the oldest and purest GBAs in NZ to my knowledge - a 14cm breeding pair. Happy to help. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ktttk Posted June 9, 2007 Author Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 Thanks for that BlueandKim, clears things up a bit for me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caserole Posted June 9, 2007 Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 Blueandkim posted same time as me so I'll leave it at that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carla Posted June 9, 2007 Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 What may be true for germany isn't the same as NZ. We have older purer stock as we don't have commercial fish farms mixing things up. ... and I own the oldest and purest GBAs in NZ to my knowledge - a 14cm breeding pair. Where did Germany come in there Blue or Kim? And if you own the purest strain then I must get some off you some day - who wants brown spots anyway? Especially German ones ... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Faran Posted June 9, 2007 Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 Germany was mentioned in the thread/article on Planetcatfish which was referenced earlier. Caserole has fish from the same line (offspring of mine) as do a few others. A few odd splotches here and there (maybe 1 in 100 fish have a small spot) have been seen in the past, but the colouration seen above results from crossing out with common BNs (ancistrus sp3) and is the reason why crossing ancistrus highly discouraged. As for getting some off me, I've had a run of bad luck with GBA babies in the last few months. I had a huge spawn of over 300 babies in mid-April but they succumbed to an infection due to overfeeding while I was on vacation. I'm hoping for a good batch soon tho! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caserole Posted June 9, 2007 Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 I actually got my breeders from Auckland. The point is we really should be trying to keep them as true as we can rather then making it worse by out xing to the common B/N. This has already a cured in some pet shops by housing adult common and GBA's together then selling the resulting fry rather then destroying them - all for the mighty $$. It is my intention to try and eliminated black markings from the GBA's produced in my fish room !! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coelacanth Posted June 9, 2007 Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 The point is we really should be trying to keep them as true as we can rather then making it worse by out xing to the common B/N. hear hear! It is a continuing problem, and the thing that is worst about it is if the young from crosses look like either of the parent species, then they get bred back into those species by unsuspecting aquarists. Same in bird-keeping, with people breeding different species of pheasants or finches together. I think its disgraceful behaviour personally Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ktttk Posted June 9, 2007 Author Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 So the reason for the GBA having black splotches is because: a) GBAs have been outcrossed with common BNs or b) The very first male GBA imported was bred with a wild type GBA (which I assume is brown)? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FuglyDragon Posted June 9, 2007 Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 GBA or L144 is a result of a genetic defect known as Amelanism. It is basically the same principal as an albino defect but is a lack of dark pigment (as opposed to a lack of all pigments in albinoism). Albino - lacking all pigment Melanistic - Excess Dark pigments Amelanistic - Lacking Dark Pigments Melanism / Amelanism happens in many differnt species, cats, snakes, pheasants and fish just like albinoism does. Some species are far more prone to it than others, as far as I can discover its realitively rare in fish but quite common in cats, birds and some reptiles. As it is a genetic defect it is passed from parent to offspring using the usual laws of genetics. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coelacanth Posted June 9, 2007 Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 the male GBA wasn't the very first male imported from the wild, just the only one that was leucistic or amelanistic. The case originally was that patches of the wild colour would reappear in the offspring, but it seems from what BlueandKim was saying that the hybridising with common bristlenoses is now another factor. I guess the answer now is both a) and b) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.