Ancistrus Genetics

Eric1 · Post by **Eric1** » 28 Sep 2007, 03:22

Does anyone know of any research that has been done on Ancistrus genetics as far as what the percentage of long fins showing up in offspring if 1 parent has long fins and the other does not, And the percentage of albino fry with albino parents?
Thanks
Eric

RoseFishWatcher · Post by **RoseFishWatcher** » 28 Sep 2007, 03:59

Don't know if this is what you're looking for, but this is all I know about genetics:

I assume (although I don't know for sure, as I've never looked for actual data on the subject) that both long fins and albinism are single recessive traits.

Assuming so:

albino parents = 100% albino fry

Long fins would depend on the parents. If one is not long finned, it is either LL or Ll (meaning it may or may not carry the gene for long fins). LL does not carry the recessive gene, so none of the fry would have long fins (but all would have the ability for long finned offspring). Ll carries a recessive gene, and about 50% would have long fins. There's really no way to tell LL from Ll, except by checking the percentage of offspring with long fins.

Hope this helps a bit.

apistomaster · Post by **apistomaster** » 28 Sep 2007, 15:21

This is exactly the same case for Pure Normal X Albino
Cross their progeny and you will get 25% albino
75 % Normal with 25% of these will be carrying the recessive albino genes. The remaining 50% will be normal. Only trial crosses can determine which ones are carrying the recessive albino gene.

Adding in the long fin means many carefully followed crosses would be required to figure out which fish carry what genes.
The right combination could produce Normal, albino, normal LF and albino LF..

Redcatman · Post by **Redcatman** » 28 Sep 2007, 16:14

The previous replies all assume each character is determined by a single gene. Albinism frequently is in fish and therefore my best guess would be the same as the other replies. However, characters may be determined by more than one gene in which case things get more complicated. Several different types of crosses are needed, and the important thing is to keep accurate records of the numbers of different fin types in any spawnings. Has anyone done any crosses with long-finned Ancistrus? Do all long-finned types look the same or is there variation in the length of the long fins?

MatsP · Post by **MatsP** » 28 Sep 2007, 16:25

I don't know the answer, but from what I've read, there are multiple "long fin" variations.

I always thought myself that it is a single gene phenomenom. [And of course, it's far from unique to Ancistrus, there are MAMNY forms of fish that throw long fin varieties, barbs, cichlids (angels for example), danios, as well other catfish - cories for example].

--
Mats

Post by **Barbie** » 28 Sep 2007, 17:39

Until the long fin genetics were added into the "common" ancistrus gene pool, there was almost no problem with albino ancistrus throwing anything but. It's my opinion that the longfin albino bristlenose were developed from a different species than the "common" albino bristlenose available in the US. If you cross the two, the fry will be just like starting over with a heterozygous trait, meaning you're back to breeding the fry to related fry to establish an albino "base" again. I don't think this random hybridization is a great idea at all, but it seems to be cropping up much more commonly in the last few years.

Barbie

fishlvr · Post by **fishlvr** » 28 Sep 2007, 22:37

Well, to prevent hybrids, why not cross a longfin normal "common" Ancistrus with a non-longfin albino "common" Ancistrus, and breed the offspring

MatsP · Post by **MatsP** » 28 Sep 2007, 23:00

And how would that prevent hybdrids, if one of the varieties you are breeding is already a hybrid?

A hybrid is where you've crossed two species, say a Lion and a Tiger to take some fairly well-known species. Ok, so the result here is infertile, just like a Mule (cross between horse and donkey).

If you have a fertile hybrid and cross it with a pure species, you still have a hybrid. No matter how many times you do this, there will still be some small part of genetical "outsider" in the crosses.

--
Mats

apistomaster · Post by **apistomaster** » 29 Sep 2007, 03:12

Barbie wrote:Until the long fin genetics were added into the "common" ancistrus gene pool, there was almost no problem with albino ancistrus throwing anything but. It's my opinion that the longfin albino bristlenose were developed from a different species than the "common" albino bristlenose available in the US. If you cross the two, the fry will be just like starting over with a heterozygous trait, meaning you're back to breeding the fry to related fry to establish an albino "base" again. I don't think this random hybridization is a great idea at all, but it seems to be cropping up much more commonly in the last few years.

Barbie

Hi Barbie,
Are you saying you have seen normal colored show up in crosses between normal albino and long fin albino?

Eric1 · Post by **Eric1** » 29 Sep 2007, 03:24

I have colored and albino fry from albino parents. Do you think the fry will be sterile?
Thanks
Eric

Post by **Barbie** » 29 Sep 2007, 06:22

That's exactly what I'm saying Larry. I had a long fin albino female (close your eyes Shane!) in a tank with a young standard albino male. I wasn't TRYING to spawn them and would actually have preferred they didn't. I did euthanize all but 3 of the fry btw, which went to a house where I know they won't be sold on. The fry were ALL brown from both albino parents. The standard albinos were from my strain I've kept for 8 years now with occasional infusions of new genetics, always using my same old, well travelled, male.

Eric why would the fry be sterile? Sterility only results from hybridism between species not closely related enough, not all. For that matter, do you know that the fry aren't the same species?

Barbie

Eric1 · Post by **Eric1** » 29 Sep 2007, 12:59

They were sold as ABN. They came in on the same order at the LFS. Thats pretty much all I know. Is there a way to find out what they are?

Maybe I am not understanding something. The fry you had. What was wrong with them and why did you euthanize them?
Eric

Post by **Barbie** » 29 Sep 2007, 17:49

They were hybrids. I didn't create them on purpose, but obviously allowing them out into the gene pool would have just further contaminated a genetic soup that is already labeled as Ancistrus sp. 3, IMO. There wasn't anything "wrong" with them as far as physically other than that. I guess I should also mention that more than 50% were long fin. In my defense, it was only 10 or 12 fish that lived from the spawn and I euthanized them immediately. I allowed the 3 to live so I could see what they'd look like is all and found them a 90 gallon tank with a friend that can't breed Ancistrus no matter how hard he tries

.

There is no way to tell which species of Ancistrus you purchased by looking at them. Long fin fish throw a number of shortfin fry in every spawn. Those fish appear exactly like regular Ancistrus, they're just carrying the genetics for long fins, and IMO, they were developed from another common looking species than the one that's been regularly distributed here is all.

Barbie

tzwms · Post by **tzwms** » 29 Sep 2007, 18:11

Just to muddy the water a bit:

I was following a thread on another forum (I'll see if I can find it when I get back home) that described albino-ism as a 2 gene combination - one for color or not and one for albino or color. The thread pointed to some published literature. Could be that these genes are enough different in different species that when crossed, albinos still result in normal colored fry.

Just my 2 cents

apistomaster · Post by **apistomaster** » 29 Sep 2007, 19:32

Based on Barbie's results that would seem to be the case. Those genes would have to be on different loci on each fish to produce albino and normal from an albino X albino breeding.

The situation regarding common ancistrus being bred is reminiscent of the Platy and Swordtail aquarium strains.
Their are no pure bred Platies or Swordtails among the common commercial aquarium strains. Just some have more platy or Swordtail genes than the other but remain hybrids. Only wild caught uncontaminated fish are still pure.

Which goes back to the crux of the matter. The origins of our common bushy nose were lost unlike the live bearer analogy I cited which had origins under lab conditions with accurate records kept by the late Joanne Norton, fish genetist and Dr. Myron gordon.

Karsten S. · Post by **Karsten S.** » 07 Oct 2007, 11:13

Hi,

tzwms wrote:I was following a thread on another forum (I'll see if I can find it when I get back home) that described albino-ism as a 2 gene combination - one for color or not and one for albino or color. The thread pointed to some published literature.

that's interesting. Could you give some more information, which forum was that...?
I thought that albinism as well as xanthorism are both single recessive traits. I've got this information of very well informed people from a different forum. I will check if they refer to any literature.

[mod edit: undisable BBCODE, making the quoting work... --matsp]

Post by **Shane** » 08 Oct 2007, 12:43

Just to point out an additional factor... I do not think that all of these mutations were achieved through line breeding "natural" mutations. Some were likely induced mutations through radiation or other means (a common practice). This would explain why these mutations do not "breed true." It also explains why a few years ago there were nothing but the simple common Ancistrus coming out of SE Asia and in just a couple of years we started seeing half a dozen different mutations.

Fixing mutations in live bearers that can throw several generations a year is one thing, but even under the best of care, it takes 12-18 months to throw an F2 generation with Ancistrus. It would take years and years to fix a trait in Ancistrus that could be fixed in a guppy population in months. Albinism is probably fixed as it is a fairly common mutation.

Barbie, I doubt your fish were hybrids. The long fin albino female may not be able to pass her traits. A woman exposed to radiation (from a bomb or nuclear accident) is born deformed with one arm. She is not likely to have one armed children, but, depending on the damage to her genes, is probably more likely to have children with deformities (or mutations, if one prefers the term).

The history of line breeding fish populations to fix mutations, be they Discus, angels, guppies, platies, etc. is well known and the development of nearly all lines are documented in the hobbyist literature. No such thing for Ancistrus. They just appeared in the hobby overnight.
-Shane

Post by **Barbie** » 09 Oct 2007, 17:21

She has since been used with a normal longfin albino male and thrown only Albino fry though. Otherwise, I'd probably agree with you. These fish were also very small when I received them, too small to have been badly treated, IMO, without risking fertility, which I've had zero problem with.

While they did appear on the market suddenly, the expense was high due to limited quantities. I think it's more likely that someone worked with and tweaked the strain and then it suddenly took off when they went public with them. They do actually "breed true". Just like if you breed veil angels, you always get a certain percentage of them that aren't as veiled and some that are "super veiled". That can be as easily explained as the genetic being a recessive that needs two copies of the gene to show up.

I have seen it happen 3 or 4 times now, for people that I have sold fry btw. I now try to only sell shortfin longfins here locally and sell my standard shortfin albinos out of the area, so that if people breed them they can at least get albino fry. Anyone with fry of mine that have crossed the two strains gets brown fry. It took a year or so to realize it had happened when people had unexpected spawns and what not. I seriously doubt that some of those second generation fish that are the result of a successful breeding are still showing that sort of damage, yet able to reproduce. Radiation damage is going to affect reproduction first thing, according to any information I've read in the past. The fry are perfect, other than having flowing fins, with a better than average grown out rate.

Barbie

fatcatfish · Post by **fatcatfish** » 13 Aug 2011, 06:18

I have bred longfin red and blue eye, all partent were long fin,yet the fry are only 20% longfin. if the long fin gene are recessive and there are two genes involves this should mean the avarage short fins from both partents longfins should be not more than 25% , yet I am consistently getting 75% short fins. can anyone explain.

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Ancistrus Genetics

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