Is it true if you breed a Severum brother with a Severum sister the offspring has defects/deformities?
Fact or false?
- Thread starter fish042099
- Start date
First off, let's define 'deformity' as any trait that causes a reduction in fitness of the individual, compared to the 'norm'.
There are three ways that any individual of any species can have a deformity - the first is due to physical/physiological trauma, and does not have much to do with genetics at all. We're not really talking about that, so it doesn't really matter anyways. Now the other two has something to do with genetics - the first is due to mutations in the DNA coding of the individual, which may result in the mis-production of proteins or other molecules, causing deformities. This can be masked if it is a recessive trait, its mis-translation could be masked by the dominant allele. However this really applies to all individuals of any species as well, so again not entirely important here.
The last is what is important to this discussion. Every animal has genes that codes for 'deformities'. In the case of inbreeding, the 'normal' parents can carry plenty of deformity-encoding genes, especially if they're recessive. These genes can accumulate and result in well, deformed offsprings. In the case of selective breeding, like what you're about to attempt, the chances of getting deformities is even higher as you're not caring too much about other traits, besides what you want. But genetic recombination is a stochastic process - meaning that what you end up from two parents will be up to chance. So if you breed two sibling severums you can get deformities, but it's not an absolute. Even if they're 'aquarium strains', i.e. inbred over generations, there's a chance that you can breed them for generations more and obtain red severums without any visible or debilitating defects. Or it could happen right away. It's all up to chance. In some cases there's a higher chance than others - but I don't believe it's the case with severums. Their genetics is relatively... 'good', not that 'genetics' can be 'good/bad/unstable' but it's probably easiest to be understood that way.
Breeding a grandfather and a granddaughter can help, but it's not absolute. In the case of inbred aquarium strains, if you do happen to see deformities in the grandchildren, chances are that the grandfather is already quite 'unstable' and hence breeding grandfather-daughter won't really help.
There are three ways that any individual of any species can have a deformity - the first is due to physical/physiological trauma, and does not have much to do with genetics at all. We're not really talking about that, so it doesn't really matter anyways. Now the other two has something to do with genetics - the first is due to mutations in the DNA coding of the individual, which may result in the mis-production of proteins or other molecules, causing deformities. This can be masked if it is a recessive trait, its mis-translation could be masked by the dominant allele. However this really applies to all individuals of any species as well, so again not entirely important here.
The last is what is important to this discussion. Every animal has genes that codes for 'deformities'. In the case of inbreeding, the 'normal' parents can carry plenty of deformity-encoding genes, especially if they're recessive. These genes can accumulate and result in well, deformed offsprings. In the case of selective breeding, like what you're about to attempt, the chances of getting deformities is even higher as you're not caring too much about other traits, besides what you want. But genetic recombination is a stochastic process - meaning that what you end up from two parents will be up to chance. So if you breed two sibling severums you can get deformities, but it's not an absolute. Even if they're 'aquarium strains', i.e. inbred over generations, there's a chance that you can breed them for generations more and obtain red severums without any visible or debilitating defects. Or it could happen right away. It's all up to chance. In some cases there's a higher chance than others - but I don't believe it's the case with severums. Their genetics is relatively... 'good', not that 'genetics' can be 'good/bad/unstable' but it's probably easiest to be understood that way.
Breeding a grandfather and a granddaughter can help, but it's not absolute. In the case of inbred aquarium strains, if you do happen to see deformities in the grandchildren, chances are that the grandfather is already quite 'unstable' and hence breeding grandfather-daughter won't really help.