What's my odds?

[ScottishFish]

You may have seen my thread on the guy selling a £500 pleco, well me and my two mates went to his place to buy fish, we came away with £130 worth between us!

Now 8 fish got were juvenile BN plecos, and I mean really Juvenile. Largest is like an inch long at the most. Prices were soo good I snapped them up, here's what I got - 4x common BN £2.50 each, 2x Albino BN 3.50 each and 2x longfin Red Black BN's £6 each.

I'm hoping to breed them when they get big as BN's are scarce where I live and I could make some money to fund my addiction!

So what's my odds on getting a breeding pair, and also can they interbreed? I'm getting conflicting info online and I'm really struggling in general to get info on Red Blacks, so any info there would be appreciated!

Cheers guys!

[butterbean]

I just got my little albino BN and I did quite a bit of reading on them before I got him. From everything I read they are quite easy to breed as long as you have a cave. I don't want to breed any fish but I guess the male watches the eggs and raises the fry and will watch more than one females eggs at a time.

[dmagerl]

They will all interbreed so you should keep them separate if you want them to breed true.

So if you consider the 4 regular BNs, there are 16 combinations of sexes, only 2 of which result in a single sex, MMMM and FFFF. 2 out of 16 is 12.5% so you have an 87.5% chance of having two sexes with 4 BNs.

For the Albinos and longfins where you only have 2 of each, 2 out of 4 combinations result in two sexes so you have a 50% chance of a pair.

If you take all 8 of them together you have a 2 in 256 chance of having one sex, or a 99% chance of having at least 1 male or female.

As for the kids, if the common BNs are BB (2 brown genes), then all the kids wil be common. If both parents are BA (both brown & albino genes), Then you can have BB, BA, AB, AA kids. Since brown is dominant, you'll get 3/4 common and 1/4 albino kids.

If you cross an albino AA parent with a common BB parent, Then you can get BA, BA, AB, AB kids so all will be common. If you cross an AA albino with a BA common, then you end up with AB, AA, AB, AA kids and you'll end up with 50% albino and 50% common kids.

I dont know how the genetics for longfins work.

[butterbean]

to you dmagerl......I wouldn't have known the genetics even if I had thought of it....

[Dennis Bissett]

I have 4 commons (2 m 2 f), of which i suspect 1 male is servicing both females
This litter got 89 fry no albinos, last litter was 100 plus, about 30% albinos, litter before was 50 odd with 3 albinos. The wonderful little fellows are funding my next tank (180 gallon)

[dmagerl]

I have a common and an albino and yes, the ratio of common to albino fry varies because its all probability. I must have a BA (Brown Albino) male and an AA female because I get some number of albino fry. Its been as high as 75% albino fry and as low as just a few albino fry but on average theory says it will be 50%.

Yes, they are prolific egg layers. I've just been giving them to the LFS, just to get rid of them. But they are cute when they all swarm a zucchini all at once.

[ScottishFish]

Thanks for all the advice so far!

I think I will just let them all mix and see what I get, unless these red blacks come out to be 1m1f then I might attempt to specifically breed them.

With BN breeding do they need to choose partners like cichlids or as long as you've got 1m1f they will breed?

[dbosman]

Unless you use hormonal treatments, fish breed when they feel like it. Plecos like to breed during stormy weather. Seasonal change type weather.

Check out plecoplanet, plecoworld, planetcatfish for specifics.

[ScottishFish]

Will have a look at them

[MuckyFish]

Current theory is that Plecos do not pair like cichlids a male will try and get all the girls in his cave to lay eggs for him. Once they've laid eggs they leave the cave or hollow.

Good luck!