Which Hypancistrus am I? (Mum, Dad and the kids)

[Jools]

Jools, you already know this but this line that you got from me originates from Aquarium Glaser. I don't know how the original grandparents used to produce this line looked. I don't know who Glaser used to breed them, but for the "L236" you got from me they used Budrovcan.

Hi Haakon,

This was the form sold as L173, of which I bought two, from you as you say, but via the auction. Not the "L236 Glaser" - of which I have a group also from you which are also spawning.

Cheers,

Jools

[HaakonH]

Jools,

Both the L173s and the L236s came to me at about the same time from Glaser. They were very reluctant to provide me with information about the source they used to breed them, but after much research I tracked down Budrovcan as the breeder for the L236. He had received a single pair from Glaser, this pair had been hand-picked by Hans Georg Evers at an exporter in Altamira. Evers recommended this pair to Glaser. They were picked from a bunch of Hypancistrus, so my thoughts are that they may have been 2 eye-catching individuals belonging to a Hypancistrus form that may be less striking for the most part.

As for the L173s though, I can only refer to the pics shown at Glasers website. They have some adult wilds portrayed there. If these are the ones they used to breed the line they sold back then, I don't know.

And about that funding idea for describing Xingu-species, I personlly think it's a very interesting idea. What numbers would be required for the Brazilian ichthyologists to get going on such a project?

Haakon

[Janne]

Funding, it's not so simple to just provide some money for fieldwork to Brazilian researchers, even to these with a reputation by their names. To not go to deep into this issue it can be extremely expensive and sometime waste of money, I think some of the foreign researchers that have been in Brazil in collaboration with some Brazilian scientists may have some experience of this or at least know a little how it works here, it's very important whom that receive the funds and how they are used.
We support the researchers at the federal university in Belem as much we can and on request, we provide fish and collecting data, researchers that want or need to make a fieldwork we provide the contacts with our suppliers and fishermen that helps them if possible, the cost is quite low compared without this help. It's just in the initial fase but with time I think and hope the cooperation between the business and the science will increase, it's important to make it easier and cheaper for the science to get access to material they need for their research.

Janne

[Jools]

Funding, it's not so simple to just provide some money for fieldwork to Brazilian researchers, even to these with a reputation by their names.

I am not proposing that - I am proposing funding the US based collaboration effort.

Jools

[Janne]

I am not proposing that - I am proposing funding the US based collaboration effort.

Ok, if they need support and help locally we maybe can be of help, let me know when times comes.

Janne

[The.Dark.One]

This is pic of one of Mark's (hairy) males that originated from Jools who got them as L236 (as mentioned in above posts).

[Jools]

Yeah, I'm pretty comfortable with these things being

L399

. Which in turn will likely be equivalent to a few other numbers the lowest being L066. When they get bigger they look a like adult L236 - I've kept a few that are quite white. As adults they are quite a good size for

Hypancistrus

but will bred at half their full grown size.

Cheers,

Jools

[The.Dark.One]

Hi Jools
So is that the current thinking then, that the ones you got as L236 are L399?

[Jools]

Yes. However, I'm not sure L236 just isn't a selection at the exporters. As I say, the adults look identical. Some of the offspring look like L236 until they get to 5cm or so.

Jools

[The.Dark.One]

The fish in my earlier pics is about 8cm TL (from memory) and was much yellower than some of the others. They all look different (thicker and more broken lines?) to the L399 that are in Pier?:




The ones from you in my earlier pics look more like L173 in Ingo's book?

[Jools]

The ones from the beginning of this thread are a different species / variety and not the parents of the fish I gave to Mark.

Jools

[The.Dark.One]

Hi Jools

Yes, I know, I'm just trying to pin down what the ones of Mark's are (though I know this is sometimes impossible, bearing in mind the discussions on this thread). The pattern just seems more like L173 than L399 to me on Mark's fish.

[HaakonH]

Although tempting, I think basing ID on pattern alone is a bit risky. We still tend to use it as a general rule, usually following these conceptions (excluding all other traits like bodyshape, eyesize etc.):

L066 = a lot of thin black lines
L173 = fewer, broader black lines
L236 = even fewer, both broad and narrow black lines and dots
L333 = a lot of thin or sometimes broader black lines
L399/400 = a lot of thin black lines and/or dots

Still most of these varieties are known to contain individuals straying from the norm, confusing the matter even more. This makes me more reluctant to base ID on pattern alone. When we consider the lower Xingu varieties as well and their even more extreme variation, the whole ID'ing issue becomes a severe headache. Tank bred fish is often even harder to tell apart due to the obvious risk of crossbreeding.

My point is that to correctly label the fish which this thread is about is nearly impossible. The originals likely came from somewhere in Rio Xingu, but what they actually were is extremely difficult to answer. Maybe they were two different varieties that looked similar? Maybe not The line produced by spawning them is certainly nice to look at, but to me they don't fit clearly into any of the l-numbers we know. They don't really match L399 based on how we like to define L399, but I'm open to the possibility anyway.

I think the Xingu holds several slightly different strains of Hypancistrus, naturally separated by the borders within the river that these fish rarely cross. Pick one from this spot, one from that, put them in your boat and bring them to Altamira where they are put in the same holding tank at the exporters (where they also keep the "same" species caught by a different fisherman at a different site) before they are all shipped out to us confused hobbyists under the same name. Then we breed them and wonder why the offspring don't fit the bill.

Haakon

[The.Dark.One]

Hi Haakon

I agree pattern alone is not 100% and that's why I get a bit frustrated when people post things on forums (including Facebook group pages) and confidently say "It IS a LXXX" or "It is NOT...", but at the end of the day most of us have only pattern to go on as the location is not always known.

I'm going to tentatively say that the fish in my post of 6.18pm 25/7/12 are L173.

[Yann]

Jools,

They were very reluctant to provide me with information about the source they used to breed them, but after much research I tracked down Budrovcan as the breeder for the L236. He had received a single pair from Glaser, this pair had been hand-picked by Hans Georg Evers at an exporter in Altamira. Evers recommended this pair to Glaser. They were picked from a bunch of Hypancistrus, so my thoughts are that they may have been 2 eye-catching individuals belonging to a Hypancistrus form that may be less striking for the most part.

Haakon

Another intersting point is that out of the 1st spawn he managed to get only 25% of such beautiful individuals...then he had brothers and sisters to spawn together on several generation and at best the rate was 33% or something like this...the other being more conventional...still highly consanguinity...

but agree in the end far less species than most people have expected...

At least it is nice to see that the vision on these is gently changing!!
Cheers
Yann

[HaakonH]

That's the thing: If you want to, you can line-breed any of the variable Xingu forms to create more white. Maybe L236 is a form where the chance of getting specimens with more white and less black is higher than what the case is with for example L066, but even L066, L333 and L399 sometimes produce offspring which could easily be labelled L236 due to their striking pattern. In theory these one-offs could probably be line-bred in the same way as Budrovcan did with his L236 to gradually create more individuals with the most desired pattern. In L236 and L173, such one-offs basically gave them their original identity and their number, I believe. But what about all their duller siblings? They are out there too, in the aquariums of hobbyists. But they are probably called something else, like "lower Xingu" and so on...

Haakon

[The.Dark.One]

In theory these one-offs could probably be line-bred in the same way as Budrovcan did with his L236 to gradually create more individuals with the most desired pattern.

Haakon

So do you reckon Budrovcan's were actually L236?

[HaakonH]

I reckon they could well be yes But there's no way I can say for sure, I don't think anyone can really. But I don't think any other l-number fits Budrovcan's fish any better. I haven't seen the original breeding pair Budrovcan used to start his project.

Haakon

[Yann]

Wasn't the adult pictured in one of the issue of the BSSW bulletin??

That's the thing: If you want to, you can line-breed any of the variable Xingu forms to create more white. Maybe L236 is a form where the chance of getting specimens with more white and less black is higher than what the case is with for example L066, but even L066, L333 and L399 sometimes produce offspring which could easily be labelled L236 due to their striking pattern. In theory these one-offs could probably be line-bred in the same way as Budrovcan did with his L236 to gradually create more individuals with the most desired pattern. In L236 and L173, such one-offs basically gave them their original identity and their number, I believe. But what about all their duller siblings? They are out there too, in the aquariums of hobbyists. But they are probably called something else, like "lower Xingu" and so on...

Haakon

Sure it could be done with line breeding but aren't we doing selection like what is done with Guppy, Platy, Discus, albinos fish, ballon fish etc...so basically trying to fix a uncommon trait that would be hardly find in the nature just because we find it more beautiful and also because it will fetch more money if we sell it...

Cheers
Yann

[HaakonH]

Yann,

There is a nice article in the BSSW report Heft 3 2011, with a lot of pictures. The article states how Budrovcan received his original pair from Glaser in 2002, and explains how most of the offspring looks like L066, but a few one-offs showed more white and these were kept for line-breeding. 9 years later the percentage of one-offs in his broods had risen to 15-20 %. Theres no picture of the original pair in the article, only pictures of the nice specimens. There are no pics showing specimens which look like the ones I bred from the same line, which looked like this:



I kept a breeding colony of about 13 fish, most of the offspring never looked much like L236. This was the closest I got:



Most of my group was lost in a power break, but some of the offspring survived at a different location. They are now grown ups, and breeding attempts have just been initiated. They look like this:



Aquarists have line-bred all sorts of fish, and most people don't protest on the issue. Take Symphysodon or Pterophyllum as good examples. Surely it's possible to do it with Hypancistrus too. But it goes to show how L236 most likely is a much less striking species than what the original picture leads us to believe. And this would also most likely mean that many other specimens of the same form have been imported under different labels, which again has led to the many mix-ups and crossbreeds we see in the hobby today.

Haakon

[Unungy]

Hi Haakon

I'm going to tentatively say that the fish in my post of 6.18pm 25/7/12 are L173.

Hey Haakoon
I've been trying to stay out of this one but it is hard sometimes.
I was trying to locate your post so I can see the picture.

[The.Dark.One]

This is pic of one of Mark's (hairy) males that originated from Jools who got them as L236 (as mentioned in above posts).

Do you mean this Unungy?

[Unungy]

This is pic of one of Mark's (hairy) males that originated from Jools who got them as L236 (as mentioned in above posts).

Do you mean this Unungy?

I think so,

I am so used to see the L173 related more with the zebras, than any other Hypancistrus. I guess a more looking Zebra kind of fish, bigger, brown eyes, bulkier etc.

Hypancistrus sp(l173)