Breeding · Strains ·Jan 26, 2021

Breeding and Strains: Traits of Breeding

Traits of breeding:

Introuduction:

I’m not gonna lie this is probably one of the harder posts I wrote, just simply because everyones idea of a perfect Flowerhorn is different, I asked a few of the people I look up to and came to the conclusion why not write it like I was taught or more so guided

As a breeder what are you wanting to achieve in a pairing ?: or what does it lack ?

But don’t just look at the fish look at there parents if possible, this will give a idea on what traits are strong in the line.

Now break it down into all of its traits:

Type (zz, kamfa, malau)
Shaping (body, fins, face, jaw, tail)
Colour (what colour do u want, do u want more spread or deeper colour)
Pearl (fine dot, thick dot, worm, armour)
Now what does parent A bring and parent B, does this equal something in your vision? Find what fits your vision, set a goal and work to it and it will improve the Flowerhorns you are breeding
But this is a refined version and honestly I don’t think it will come across 100%

And I think it’s best written to make us question the traits better by understanding them first, origins and all.

So Before we can chase a trait to improve our lines I think we as breeders should understand where these traits come from or at least ask where we think they did.

When I learnt them I was never taught word for word but I was asked to question the traits I want:

what makes a srd super red, where is that gene from
what the easiest way to achieve pearls, what fish makes what pearls

So let’s start with the red:

We must understand all Flowerhorns have faders in there genes, we know that Flowerhorns are made from trimac, Veija species, Texas, Midas, red terrors and Red Devils, Midas and red devil we know fade and fading as we have seen in red Texas breeding is what makes them red, a dark deep red
Therefore we must assume All srd have a fader gene in them, that fader gene gives a deeper red and a fuller body coverage
So if we want a deeper red or fuller body coverage we have 2 options, cross to a male/female with these traits or cross to a fader, the redder the fader the better the outcome in srd terms.

This will also give you two tones and gold base (gb):

Now pearl:

We have so many different types of pearls, fine dot pearl, thick dot pearl, worm pearl and armour pearl
Looking at the heritage again Texas and a Veija species called hartweigi have pearls, there may be more but to keep this short this is where louhan (no pearl) became Zhen Zhou (pearled louhan) in the early days and these zz were mainly dot and fine dot, through line breeding thicker pearls were achieved
It’s believed this is how silks were made but no one is 100% they essentially are a full pearled Flowerhorn, using A silk x to a zz with normal pearl you will get armour pearl
This is now a faster way to achieve full pearl but it’s not as simple as breeding a zz and a silk will equal nice pearl you have to selectively breed it to the style pearl you want it may take 3-4gens before reaching this

This is how you can look at all the traits:

Ask questions where did they come from?
How can I improve it?

Through my own observations the following I have noticed:

Louhan/zz underbite comes from trimac
The puffy lips come from trimac, Texas, red devil, Midas
Kok originally comes from red devil, Midas and Veija species but through selective breeding we have improved the size
if talking kamfa there lips are from synspilum, fenestrus, breihordi and most other Veija species

But we cannot disregard the culling process regardless of the parents and our beliefs on there quality, if we cull correctly we will achieve better Flowerhorn within the constraints of the parents genes and may even make something that surprises us think of it as quality control and it’s not as hard.