I'm all for adding things to a breed if it will interest serious breeders/owners, but the original post stated that those who want to breed VT shouldn't be discouraged just because they're choosing veil tails over halfmoons or other IBC breeds. As long as they are the type of person who is going to put effort into the breed, not just because they can make some quick cash selling the babies, I think they should encouraged not told that their bettas will never sell just because they are veil tails. Even if they don't sell great, and have to be practically given away for a while, having people with extra time and money enough to experiment with some veil tails will hopefully improve the breed, and bring more interest from people who like other types.
I think after i finish with my white full moons i will try to maby try to breed kings with a top of the line v tail just for the heck of it although it sounds kinda ify to me
It will probably be a slow process... That goes without saying. But if there are patient people that want to breed veiltails for the betterment of the breed, they have to start somewhere. Eventually, they can get to introducing new and different things, but they have to build up from some foundation. Patient people with the determination and motivation to do it shouldn't just be told that they will fail or that they are being irresponsible.
Introducing ee to vt would be near impossible, because even if you breed a ee to a ee you usually have to wait until f3 to see it, that is how recessive it is. I wonder if we could start a serious petition to the ibc demanding veil tail becomes a recognized class?
Aren't a bunch of people in IBC trying to bring them back already?
Also the other issue with breeding vt's is where do you get your starting stock? Petshops? No thanks, those fish are not healthy animals and most are culls or from huge mills with no recorded background. There are also very few with good form, most of them I see have messy toplines. How do you fix these?
Wait, is the ee trait controlled by multiple genes then? In simple recessive heredity, a recessive trait would only show if both pairs of alleles were recessive. So, a recessive-recessive cross should only result in offspring with recessive traits? (Sorry for derailing, extremely curious about the genetic mechanics of things...)
LadyV, you do realize most breeders with champion lines.. those lines started with store bettas, right? I am serious - many breeders who have won awards with spawn from pet store bettas. Sometimes they get the perfect fish the first spawn from the pet stores, sometimes it take a couple spawns.
But that is exactly the type of thinking that holds a lot of fish and new breeders back... it's almost an elitist form of thinking - "OMG they came from a store, they must be baaaaad and not worthy!" And then you have breeders who have won many awards look at them and go.. "They have good lines, good colors.. definitely can make something of them" and go on to create award winning bettas from those and their offspring.
And you fix forms from petshop fish the same you do for fish you got from a breeder with imperfect form.. you breed it out through the line. Petshop fish are NOT worse than breeder fish, they become unhealthy from living in the condition they are in for so long. They aren't culls... I'm glad majority of the good breeders and knowledgeable breeders/showers don't think this way and they still purchase petshop bettas.
And Matts.. yes, many are wanting to bring them back, right now one is getting a general census to how popular it would be.. a petition would be something to show support.
I don't think "it will take numerous generations" equals "it's near impossible." It would be a challenge, but you're never going to get anywhere thinking it's too hard to do. I doubt the first people to develop HMs got it right in the first few generations either. The history of many pure dog and cat breeds started with some person finding a mutt or stray with something different by chance and deciding they wanted to breed it to get more dogs or cats like that. Often, the first few tries were utter failure. It was only after many years that they succeeded, their hard work finally paid off, and their breed gained popularity.
Yep :) And even when breeding HMs, a good number won't be HMs with both parents as HMs. There are no perfect spawns - you will get undesirables in every spawn, you just have to work with the best of them to get a few better ones, etc. So I say - want to work with VTs, go for it and create new patterns and scaling - you can make dragon VTs and EE VTs, just have to be patient. You find some really pretty pet store bettas, then work with them and improve them. It's rare to get the perfect HM female - 180 spread on an HM female are hard to come by, but it doesn't mean the ones without it are any less, and doesn't mean you can't create some perfect HMs using them.
As I was told by a breeder I respect, breeding these fish is 90% patience.
I do wish VTs were allowed. It's just that there's no 180* spread. And the abundance at the store.. I'm going to consider breeding VTs once I start breeding, I love dragons and the dragons MoonShadow had were just simply divine. <3
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