hybridization

[the_deeb]

Just curious to hear people's thoughts on this.

Captive ray breeding is still in its early stages and we're still a long way away from being able to replace WC specimens. But, if the long term goal is to ultimately reduce WC imports for the sake of conservation, shouldn't there be a focus on breeding pure species? A lot of the captive breeding seems to involve hybridization which would preclude the use of those hybrid rays as future breeders (in the interest of not further muddying future bloodlines). This seems like it limits the overall amount of captive breeding that could be taking place.

I know that in many herp/amphibian communities where captive breeding has managed to largely replace wild imports there is a very heavy focus on not hybridizing and not putting hybrid animals on the market. Is this not a concern with rays?

 

[vitaly]

yes, hybridization in not very responsible. people should not do it. i think it happens a lot because people dont have separate tanks for different species of rays.

Also, with all these hybrids and undescribes species around, it would be difficult to know whether you have a pure undescribed animal or some weird hybrid

 

[skynoch]

This is going to happen with rays as most hobbiests don't have multiple large tanks but do like the different species. As far as breeders alot of them will have both pure and hybrids do to some of the same reasons and due to marketing. With wildcaught ray prices being so cheap for most species no breeders will touch them as it is just a big loss of money to use them for pure breeding but can use them to make some amazing hybrids. I don't think we will see any decrease in the hybridization of rays until the wildcaught prices rise and breeders will see a market.
Is it wrong to hybridize rays? It happens in nature so why can't it happen in our tanks. There are arguments for and against all with good points so this argument just seems to go in circles all the time. lol

 

[Cajun]

Part of the problem is not having enough stock as well. Most folks don't have a bunch of leo, henlei or pearl breeders at their disposal. Just motoros. So they figure it's better to have hybrid pups than no pups at all. Since hybrids are worth more than pure motoros, guess I can't blame them either.

 

[rogan josh]

Part of the problem is not having enough stock as well. Most folks don't have a bunch of leo, henlei or pearl breeders at their disposal. Just motoros. So they figure it's better to have hybrid pups than no pups at all. Since hybrids are worth more than pure motoros, guess I can't blame them either.

spot on

 

[vitaly]

just to throw this out there. hydridization does not happen in the wild as often as people think. it is actually a pretty rare event.

 

[jeffers]

but it does happen and since im not going to take a trip down to columbia or peru to release my hybrid i think me having hybrids and also hybridizing them more in the future will be just fine. if you dont like hybrids then dont buy one or keep your stock seperated. no need to call people irresponsible for raising and buying things we like.

thinking like this will get you no where. we have dogs that are mainly all man made hybrids in a way as are cats. hell i must be very irresponsible as i own dogs, cats, hybrid rays, and my asian gf lives with me. hell im a mutt myself as my ancesters are german, english, american indian, and who knows what else. pretty irresponsible of them but i dont seem to mind.

 

[vitaly]

unless you have wolf/dog, you have a normal dog. dogs and cats are all the same species, just different morphs. the same with people.

but i am not trying to argue with anyone. if you like hybrids, by all means keep one. i am not dead set against them. i just dont think that it is a good idea.

 

[skynoch]

Hard topic to discuss... but with the hybrids out there it will keep the amount of wildcaught rays from coming in. So if everyone decided they like hybrids there would be very few wildcaughts even sold and thus we would be saving more rays ever than the few that are actually captive bred.

 

[Just Toby]

The amount of wc rays that die in order to get the hobby supplied does sadden me, the herp trade was much worse than this at one point in time. I remember a time that a box of lizards could turn up at the shop or wholesaler with every single animal dead.

Personally I would prefer many captive hybrids than harming wc rays.

Hopefully the breeding will supply enough to support the trade and if people put more value on quality captive bred specimens then it would allow for more breeders to focus on more breeding.