Breeding/Hybridizing Sunfish
- Thread starter FLESHY
- Start date
Heres the idea. L. gibbosus x L. symmetricus = Hybrid1
L. peltastes x L. humilis = Hybrid2
F1 Hybrid1 x F1 Hybrid2 - Repeat for colors.
Any thing else I should try and throw in there? Haha I am considering a L. humulis x L. macrochirus hybrid...but I want to hybridize as many as possible to figure out the best ways to mix colors.
For now Im just collecting and holding the fish. By the end of next week, I should have some symmetricus in a 40g breeder that I just set up for them.
Ha not yet - next week Ill start posting pictures of the fish...then it will start getting interesting this summer or next fall when I have the chance to start doing what I want to do here.
If males turn out to be sterile breed a male of one of the parent species to the hybrid female so its 75|25 then breed a 75|25 male to a 50|50 female the resulting fry are 62.5|37.5. Those hybrids should be fertile, that is if it is like intergeneric cichlid hybridizaton. Worst case scenario is both sexes are sterile your project is obviously not going to f2.
I hope its simple and both sexes are fertile.
Good luck with your project.
Maybe your projects will give us an understanding of how hybridizaton works in sunfish.
Sent from my SPH-D600 using MonsterAquariaNetwork App
I hope its simple and both sexes are fertile.
Good luck with your project.
Maybe your projects will give us an understanding of how hybridizaton works in sunfish.
Sent from my SPH-D600 using MonsterAquariaNetwork App
Here in Arkansas we have a large aquaculture industry focused primarily on bait fish and species for pond stocking. Fish trucks make the rounds to farm supply stores during the pond stocking season and always have "hybrid bluegill" for sale. I use them to stock my aquaponic system. I believe they are a green (Lepomis cyanellus) x bluegill (Lepomis macrochirus). The reason they are popular is because 1) hybrid vigor, and 2) they are either sterile or all male thus avoiding the common problem of over-population/stunting in farm ponds. They are a rather drab fish unsuited to the ornamental market but are great eating.
I used to breed hybrid tilapia (T. hornorum x mossambica) which resulted in an all-male (99%+) population so I got larger, faster growing growing fish which didn't expend energy reproducing.
I used to breed hybrid tilapia (T. hornorum x mossambica) which resulted in an all-male (99%+) population so I got larger, faster growing growing fish which didn't expend energy reproducing.
Actually nearly all sunfish hybrids are highly fertile unlike cichlids and both sexes are fertile. The only hybrid that is sterile is Warmouth hybrids.
Actually it's 90% males, not all male hybrids. It is common for hybrid sunfish breed each other in farm ponds often reverts back to almost pure green sunfish in few generations later. Sadly it is common problem in farm ponds when not controlled by the owners or predators. It is true that hybrids are slowly to overpopulation but once they start to reproducing and no predators to control the sunfish fry numbers, they are vulnerable to stunting and overpopulation just like most sunfish beside warmouth and redear sunfish. Bad news: the hybrid vigor and large size often lost in F2/F3 hybrids, unless you are planning to cross F2 hybrid to another species such as Redear sunfish and produced Georgia Giant Hybrid Bream.
Thanks for the detailed post - I hope it is simple, and we dont for sure know what species we are using. Right now its not a paper yet, so I just want to breed to make the thing as small as possible, and as colorful as possible.
As far as intergeneric goes - none of these are, however eventually we HAVE talked about trying to force hybridization (by stripping eggs and milt) between intergeneric species - IE bass and sunfish or sunfish and crappies or sunfish and rock bass.
That is the idea, fingers crossed. At this point we are just waiting to grow them out, and get in as many other colorful species as we can!
Ill know by the end of this, but for some reason I have a similar hunch.
Yup - that would be one of the more common naturally occuring hybrids (at least around here).
As far as the tilapia go - that is interesting. I would say that spermatogenesis takes up less energy than producing eggs - but by the same token both of these costs are fairly minimal compared to the real thing that slows down growth which is the maturation and development of the organs that produce milt and eggs.
So weird that males would grow faster than females to me at least IMO.
Not to doubt you on this, but where are you getting this information. I would just like to know more about it.
Lastly - if anyone has, or knows someone who has legal rights to very colorful sunfish and can ship them across state lines let me know. We are looking to aquire as many fish as possible for this project, and if we dont have to capture them it makes it a lot easier for us on the research end to say: "This is where our fish come from." when asked by authorities. Even though we can legally keep native fishes and have a collections permit.
I've been thinking this since the beginning, but I thought you were just kinda doing this for fun... But you do not need to be here asking for advice - you need to scoot over to the NANFA forum.. There are (at least) two men over there that have been crossing species of sunfish to determine sex ratios, sizes, fertility, size at maturity, max size, etc. for years in Missouri. They have numerous posts, some in very great detail, about their experiences with various sunfish hybrids and using different sexes of different species and the various results of each.
