PlanetCatfish.com

I stumbled across this, and even though it gives me a headache just reading through it, I'm sure some of you who are interested in the topic of hybrids and crossbreeds may find it interesting:

http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2148/9/283/abstract

-Haakon

I have no idea what the legal standing is in England, with respect to specific names. It is fairly clear that it is not verified by anyone who actually knows - the number of fish sold as "Hypostomus plecostomus" which have 10+ rays in the dorsal, is a clear example of that. And many other fish are sold under names that do not make much sense at all. I recently bought some Hypancistrus sp. L411, which were labeled as "Queen Arabesque" - the shop knew they were NOT that. Also Panaque sp L002 which were labeled as "Peckoltia L15" or some such - I'm sure that's what the shop got them as...

As to commercial breeders, how many are actually breeding L-number plecos?

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Mats

The laws and new rules will concern all countries within EU, there will be huge differents for the hobby in the future either we want or not. There are several commercial breeders today that have started to breed L-numbers both in Asia and Europe (read Israel), they just need little more time to reach a good production even if a few already have started to put some species on their stocklist's.

Janne

I don't think that new rules would be bad, as such.

And I do realize that it is only a matter of time before commercial breeders will produce L-numbers.

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Mats

I don't think that new rules would be bad, as such.

Of course some of these new rules and laws will be bad both for the hobby and nature, we are talking about politicians ;) some will be good too but the thread started about cross breeding and we maybe not should end up in a political debate.

Commercial breeders are already producing l-numbers, it take some years to build up a good stock before you can start to sell in larger scale.

Janne

Janne wrote:

I don't think that new rules would be bad, as such.

Of course some of these new rules and laws will be bad both for the hobby and nature, we are talking about politicians ;) some will be good too but the thread started about cross breeding and we maybe not should end up in a political debate.

I agree

Commercial breeders are already producing l-numbers, it take some years to build up a good stock before you can start to sell in larger scale.

Janne

I understand that, and it's my argument when everyone says "Oh, there's this company in <somewhere> breeding Hypancistrus zebra, just wait, they will be cheap as dirt". Well, if they are, say, £20 each, shops will sell several a month. There are probably more than 200 shops in the UK, and in Europe there is perhaps 1500 shops all in. Times 25 a year - that's 37500 fish a year. That would take about 2000 breeding pairs to produce that number, never mind the amount of tanks needed to grow them out - and that's not counting the US, Asia and other regions that would like some. No way they will be "common and cheap" any time soon.

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Mats

MatsP wrote:breeding Hypancistrus zebra, ... No way they will be "common and cheap" any time soon.

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Mats

I just wish i'd bought the tank full when i saw them at £19.99 each.....

Remember this past summer we discussed the logistical problems associated with true, non-hobbyist commercial breeding H. zebra in the topic titled something like the ethics of buying wild Zebras or by extension, wild Brazilian Hypancistrus in general.

There is no way I can conceive of that gets around their long generational time, relatively infrequent spawning periodicity and average small brood size. Commercial breeders no doubt will participate in the overall effort to produce Zebras but most likely in conjunction with a broader based fish breeding business and as more bred specimens mature which are already in the hands of hobbyist breeders all over the world the prices of Zebras will come down some from their historical highs but will always remain among the most expensive of desirable small tropical fish.

Topic has strayed away from Hypancistrus hybrids. That will remain a problem with great potential of becoming ever more frequent as difficult as it is to identify cogeners even from the lower Rio Xingu. Added to the difficulty the fact that some types are much more highly valued than even H. zebra. We have already seen how high tensions can run between credible people holding different opinions about which fish is which L-number. Some are worth much more than H. zebra currently if there is no question about identification. But many are difficult to distinguish from variations of more common types from the same range. Aquarium bred hybrids have already been made and probably have been for some time. This problem will become worse before and if it ever gets better. What is more, there would only be a matter of time to selectively breed certain common variations or hybrids to resemble very much those species considered to be most rare and are most expensive through long term selective breeding. Some people are even deliberately breeding the bull nosed mutation of the traditional H. zebra so selective breeding is already a fact. Any fish intrinsically as variable as Hypancistrus already has the built-in genetic plasticity that makes selective breeding easy as has been the case with Symphsodon species,the Discus, only the low fecundity and longer generational factors are the constraints on developing aquarium strains.

Would for example, corydoras "peru green" Aenus and the common Aenus bred together, would that be cross breeding? or maybe the differnt variants of L333 from the Xingu and such be crossbreeding?

DJ-don wrote:Would for example, corydoras "peru green" Aenus and the common Aenus bred together, would that be cross breeding? or maybe the differnt variants of L333 from the Xingu and such be crossbreeding?

Well first, let's define crossbreeding. I'll use Wikipedia:

A crossbreed or crossbred is an animal with purebred parents of two different breeds, varieties, or populations.

...

A hybrid animal is one with parentage of two separate species, differentiating it from crossbred animals, which have parentage of the same species.

As you can see, if you use these definitions of crossbreed and hybrid, it depends entirely on whether the two groups are the same or different species. There is no way to say if it is crossbreeding or hybridization if we do not know if those fish are from the same or different species. Therefore, we come back to the question of whether or not these groups are different species and the problem of how to define these species. The difference is an entirely human construct and makes no difference to the fish.

According to the Shane's World article on C. aeneus Peru Green, they are likely the same species as C. aeneus, and therefore it would be crossbreeding.

MatsP wrote:No way they will be "common and cheap" any time soon.

Until they hybridise them with Pterygoplichthys, or worse L066 or L333

Suckermouth wrote:According to the Shane's World article on C. aeneus Peru Green, they are likely the same species as C. aeneus, and therefore it would be crossbreeding.

I would bet that C. aenus is complex of species, but in reality following on from what Mats was saying, I think breeding any fish that is of a different locality or phenotype would in my opinion be crossbreeding (as far as the hobby should be concerned).

Hi,

Until they hybridise them [...] with L066

that has already been "achieved" (sorry) and was one of the examples used by Rolo in his talk about hybridization in Hypancistrus, see the L-Numbers-Days-Thread. A picture of such a thing can be found here: http://www.l-welse.com/reviewpost/showp ... 28/cat/120.

According to our current knowledge (and collecting and systemizing that we owe to Rolo) any Hypancistrus "species", L-Number or variety can interbreed/hybridize with any other, producing fertile offspring. That´s a fact we will have to take great care about.

Cheers, Sandor