Breeding elephant ears?

[jeffegg2]

Yes, they are so tiny! My old eyes make them hard to see!

Jeff.

[jeffegg2]

They are a bit more visible now, I would say at least 50? Hard to tell they hide so well.

[atteb]

Keep the update going on how they are doing. I just bought a HMPK elephant ear male. I am going to pair him up with my HMPK female, they are both from Thailand but not related at all.

[jeffegg2]

Update: The fry are doing fine, about 40? I also bred the second big ear with a red marble hm female, that spawn has about 150? They are also growing like weeds! The plan is to cross breed to the other big ear to prevent a lot of inbreeding problems...

This makes 3 spawns that I have all together, This will be a busy summer for me!

Also I just received my API Master Test kit and it is really an eye opener! All my tanks/tubs have filters so Nitrate is my main test. Just did a 50% in all my brood tanks today.

I'll try to get a vid done of my total setup this weekend.... Most of my current setup is kinda temporary, If I decide to continue with breeding then I have an area where I can build a permenent dedicated fish room. Right now I have a few heated tanks in my finished part of the basement, and my basement half bath now has a space heater keeping it about 84F, and some shelves in there for my male jars and another spawn tub and bbs cultures.

Jeff.

[atteb]

Just thought I would post a pic of my new boy, just got him yesterday so he is a bit camera shy. I plan on pairing him up with my White HMPK female, both are from Thailand unrelated. She is not a large ear.

[Roemgie]

Originally Posted by Twilight Storm

To anyone: (but also speaking to curlyfatbottom)

Technically speaking wouldn't breeding a generation1 fish back to your parent big ear show the results?

I know you didn't go on, but isn't that how it works to bring out traits? (I am learning and am VERY interested as on this particular subject.)

On big ear x big ear: Do you know (roughly) the % of spawn that has the trait in gen 1? And roughly what % reflects the parents vs massive ear? Or is the entire spawn massive ear?

The idea of genetics is that if you breed back into the line instead of outside you are looking to get something the exact same. Now it also brings a small gene pool which will in turn put the babies at risk for more genetic diseases.

Now the idea to figure out if the big ears are a dominate trait or recessive you'll need to breed that betta with another big eared betta. If 25% of your offspring are big eared then that indicates that the gene is recessive. Meaning that the other 75% are carrying the ability to produce big eared bettas but won't because the more dominate trait is taking over.

One thing to note about recessive traits is that they can carry other traits that we don't desire or that doesn't help the fish. That's usually why a trait is recessive because our gene pool is wanting to rid of it instead of pass it on. But through long long lines of generations you can almost get it as a dominate traits and you can breed out and in the genetic line to 'perfect' your elephant ears but that can take a long time and a lot of money and of course a lot of ups and downs.

I know this is an older post but I just wanted to let you know what i know from my genetic class in college :)