Fry Thoughts & opinions?

[Tamianth]

Ok, I'm game for asking a silly question. So what do you think the fry will color out to mixing a Kin Shiro Bekko Butterfly and Yamabuki butterfly's. (One male is Lemon Matusuba, one ginkinrin)

Thoughts??? :D

[captk]

Is this a trick question?

[ozzyrockman]

Kathy, the first thing that came to mind was the song "somewhere over the rainbow" couldn't tell you why. :lol: I was told that a Yamabuki Ogen makes a good parent because they produce a large variety of offspring however they do not produce there own very well. Allen

[Tamianth]

:twisted: LOL Evil twin/triplet (tm), glad to see you here! :)
Nah, its just one I've been dying to consider & toss about in expectations but afraid to ask elsewhere since its concerning the evil (tm) butterfly koi aka longfins!

Hi Ozzy, good to see you as well! :lol:

I do recall reading a basic someplace on percentages concerning offspring, but it was a general type item. What I do know of previouse breedings, the original males where a orenji Matsuba and a Kohaku Niddan (both standar fin), there where some very nice colors in the youngsters, all standard fin. Originally I had gotten some of the year olds and was given several of the new borns. Of those I have one 2 year old, and one one year old left. We lost most of them and the two males from poisoning.

When I replaced the males, I actually bought 4 koi, one of which I know is female, one is??? and the two males. Ok, so the one oldest is typically a pond mutt, but Rocky is a true ghost fish by description. I'm encouraged on him. One of the baby's I lost did resemble the matsuba father tottally, but one resembled the mom too. There was some nice looking , I guess you would call them Ki Utsuri colored.

I'm guessing somewhere over the rainbow is right,lol!

Somebody said though that the long fins don't run true either??? :?

[Jackie Ramo]

I don't think that longfins or koi breed true no matter the bloodline. If they did the breeders wouldn't be culling thousands of the fry.

I have a longfinned pond mutt who is female and the two breeding males were both yellow matsuba.... none of the babies resemble any of these fish. Yes, I did get orange ones and the odd yellow one but unless you judged by GG's nose being passed on to the babies these guys could have come from anyone.

[Tamianth]

:D Well, I know one thing I found out with the small fry I was given. They where all black, but then I had wanted a black koi for the pond! However, every one of them developed color over the course of winter. It rather led me to thinking that culling any babies that are black may be a mistake since they seemed to be more like "late bloomers" in the color dept.

Culling is rather a controversial topic on its own though. But then again, so are butterfly's by themselves! <cue evil canned laughter (tm)>

[Jackie Ramo]

Also, the fish change so much even past the fry stage. I don't think breeding fish is like breeding dogs.

[ozzyrockman]

Jackie, I'd say that koi breeding habits are closer to rabbits and rabbits are prey to similar creatures. Allen

[Jackie Ramo]

Allen, when you breed a white rabbit to a white rabbit you Alice and a couple of White rabbits but who know what you will get when you breed two white koi.

[Ian]

Showa and Utsuri start off as black fry. A showa breeder can cull in the first few weeks as they only want the black fry to raise. It's amazing how red black and white comes from a black fry. Spawning type to type can get you many different looking fry so mixing koi can get you many things all of which may or may not look to good.

Regards Ian

[Tom C]

I think you will get a lot of nice pond mutts out of it. I also wouldn't be shocked if you didn't get a lot of longfins out of it. Just because your breeding longfins doesn't mean they will all be longfins.

Tom

[Jackie Ramo]

Is there a standard size for fins... I've noticed that not all of GG's (my female butterfly) babies have really long fins although some are longer than others. So is the measurement set or just in proportion to the fish?