deformed albino bn baby

:hi: peeps
we have around 200 albino bn babys of various sizes at the minute, all are doing really well and are growing fast :clap:

They are from 2 and a half spawns, i say 2 and a half as we had a slight problem with a multiple spawn, while our male was happily doing what he does best and fanning eggs from his chosen mate :clap: our other female (who happens to be his offspring) pushed her way in the cave and laid eggs on top of the ones already in there :wb:
he fertilised them and then kicked them out in to the tank :wb: thankfully he went back to fanning the original eggs :yes: i scooped up the discarded eggs and put them in a tumbler and nearly all hatched, however 90% of then died within 2-3 days and the surviving ones all have slight deformities :cry:
I believe (and feel free to correct me if i'm wrong) but breeding with related fish can cause weaker genes and deformities :wb: we were trying to rehome the younger female when this happened (she is now in a happy new home) and i will certainly be taking far more care in future to avoid this from happening again :yes:

I was very torn about what to do in this situation with the weaker fry :dk:
do i
a) humanely euthanize them as they had sunken bellies and i was not sure they were going to make it
or b) keep them and let mother nature decide :dk:

I finally decided (after much deliberation) to let mother nature decide

This happened around 6 weeks ago and all the babys from the 2 successful spawns are doing really well.
I have around 6 out of the 10 weaker babys left and they are doing really well, however their deformities are fairly noticeable but not as bad as we first feared.

I guess what i'm asking is, did i do the right thing ? :dk:
Has anyone on here had the same situation and what did you do ?

hi there
fisrtly- wow you love those face's..lol

I had the same situation and still do have some issues, but not due to insest. I totally 100% always let mother nature deside... cant bare taking anythings life.

How many fry do you have from the insest babies?
What kind of deformaty are you talking about?
Can you take pictures?

I think my adive would to
a) rehome them to people whol are not looking to breed
b) buy another tank and keep them
c) send them to me if you EVER think of killing them

Hope this helps...

If you are a breeder it is in the best interest of yourself and the hobby if you cull out deformed fry. Its harsh but something nature would take care of in the wild. Allowing deformed or ones that potentially carry the genes only serve to weaken the captive fish population. This is neither good for the fish or the hobby. You can never be assured of where the fish will go or what other people do with them. Should some of your fish carry a genetic defect and become engrained in the captive breeding population it could serve to spread the deformaty of genetic weakneww throughout the population.

not sure how much this helps, but I had a very small fry of cory hatch and one had a deformed pelvic fin it seems to stay flat and under him but he has grown to adult size and into the parents tank and swims fine with all the others.

I saw a small tank setup at the lfs with fish that had been bullied or injured it was one of those fluval edge cubes that are almost too small for anything but but maybe shrimp or dwarf rasboras but the tank was understocked with mostly small or young fish deformed or injured had a few small cryptocoryne and other plants and nice lighting the fish seemed happy even in such a small tank. that would be way to small for a single full grown bn but a non breeding setup in a suitable tank for a couple of those bn's (once they've been sexed and seperated) might work, if you have the room space. And if you're into plants you could use it as a plant growing tank and the bn's in caves might not mind the extra light keeping in mind that abn may be sensitive to light maybe low light amazon setup.:-/

Lornek8 said:

If you are a breeder it is in the best interest of yourself and the hobby if you cull out deformed fry. Its harsh but something nature would take care of in the wild. Allowing deformed or ones that potentially carry the genes only serve to weaken the captive fish population. This is neither good for the fish or the hobby. You can never be assured of where the fish will go or what other people do with them. Should some of your fish carry a genetic defect and become engrained in the captive breeding population it could serve to spread the deformaty of genetic weakneww throughout the population.

Click to expand...

when i read your post i could totally see your point about not knowing if they will bread but i still dont agree with culling- I think if you let the fish breed then you should take responcibilty for them and give them as good of a life as possible. We shouldn't let it happen in the first place (an idealised position i know)

In light of what you have said i still think keep them or give them to me.:yes:

Lornek8 said:

If you are a breeder it is in the best interest of yourself and the hobby if you cull out deformed fry. Its harsh but something nature would take care of in the wild. Allowing deformed or ones that potentially carry the genes only serve to weaken the captive fish population. This is neither good for the fish or the hobby. You can never be assured of where the fish will go or what other people do with them. Should some of your fish carry a genetic defect and become engrained in the captive breeding population it could serve to spread the deformaty of genetic weakneww throughout the population.

Click to expand...

Hi Lorne, what you are saying makes total sense and my head is agreeing, however the heart is saying no. My eyesight isnt so good and i can only see one with an obvious deformity which i will try to describe, one of the front Pectoral fins is kind of harelipped and instead of being flat is kind of raised to the side, Chris has seen another one like this. The others are much smaller than our stronger fry but i cant see any obvious deformity. The one i can see with the deformity will be going into a tank we will be purchasing in the near future and will be the only BN in the tank, as for the other deformed one that Chris has found and the weaker fry of this batch i am not sure. We have discussed giving them to people with the understanding they cannot be bred under any circumstances and pray they dont, i would prefer when the time is right to see if any member here would be willing to give any surviving fry from this batch a home. The deformed one although it is small is a real fighter and i find it hard to imagine culling it ( i am soft i know ). Well Chris has just been able to to show me the 2nd deformed fry and it looks the same as the other deformed fry. TBH and i know this is going to sound may be stupid but i could seriously cry, in fact i may do that later. I am still very unsure of what to do though really i know we need to sort a solution now rather than later.


Chris has managed to get some pictures of the deformed one which he will be posting ( hopefully)

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I managed to capture these 2 pics of the deformed fry in question (sorry they are not great)

both of these fish are eating (and pooping lol) and although it may appear they have sunken bellies they don't, if you look at them from the side without the deformity their bellies and everything else is fine, they are also both very active and show no signs of illness or stress.
Me and Marcy (bubbles) have decided that we will be keeping the 2 worse deformed ones (the ones in the pictures), the way we look at it is, we made the mistakes and as responsible fish keepers we will take care of them for the remainder of their lives (however long or short that may be) thus making sure they never breed and never pass the weaker gene on.

I have unfortunately just had to euthanize a smaller weaker fry from the same spawn which was slightly deformed and appeared to be suffering, i fear i may have to do the same to a couple more of them yet and i think i will only have the 2 left out of the 10 in a day or two from now and as we are keeping those 2 the weak gene will stop with them.

I can only say that this has been a very hard learned lesson for us and something we will never be repeating even if it means buying a tank each for the 2 remaining deformed ones then thats what we will do.

I agree totally with culling. It happens with every last animal you see for sale even the animals meant for our tables.

I have always fed my turtles the weak fry.

thats why i am a veggie...

I am a huge animal activist, & hmm this is a curly one, I would and I know some will frown on me, But for the greater good of the species, I would cull the deformed ones ..
Sorry :/

I would cull them. I have Bn's over 9 years old. You may have to keep them for a very long time

I am also of the opinion they should be culled but wont repeat the reasons as they have already been stated, all the best with whatever decision you make though.

If small, I agree destroy it (bawl your eyes out doing it if you want, I have).
I had half a spawn have all their tails bitten off thru the gaps in a frysaver once. I had to destroy them and I was not too happy about it.

If you want "nature" to sort it out, drop it in a predator tank.

If its larger then hang onto it for a glass cleaner in a different species tank or give it to someone who has a planted tank and just wants a window washer.

some nuture, some detroy- some just just get swept along.
Think this is one of them that could be argued back and forth and one I think we all have strong opinons about and experiences of.

just a quick update for everyone
firstly can i say many thanks for all the replies, some differing opinions but all greatly appreciated :thumbup:

In the end mother nature decided it was best for all the little deformed ones to go to fishy heaven (i had to help one or two on their way as they were suffering :cry so all the fry from the bad spawn are no more

However some good news is we have had another successful spawn since and all is fine with the latest batch :clap:

I have learned a great deal from this experience and i guess that's a least one good thing to come out of it, it was i'm guessing the part of fish keeping that all involved dread, having to make the difficult decision (which i didn't but in hindsight should of ) and has certainly taught me 2 things

1 I will do whatever it takes to avoid this ever happening again
2 If for some reason it does happen again i will make the hard decision much quicker

Many thanks again for all the replies guys :yes:

I was following this thread(not that I will ever encounter your problem ) however you handled this delima with much concern ,it is after all a personal choice, and since nature took it's course , and now you have healthy litttle ones to care for, i applaud you, no matter what your decision would have been. It was difficult no matter what you would have chosen. Good luck witht the new fry !

I think zeebo said it well- you should so much humanity in regards to this dilema.
Mother nature made its choice- I understand how hard it is- having young fry myself at the moment i look at the dogy ones and wonder what i should do.
I have a strong view that euthanasia for people is totally right- if i knew a painless way for the fish to go, i would do it.

a very interesting read and issue, that is why we all have an opinion and in the end the choice is yours indeed. Good luck with your new fry and hope they turn out wonderful. cheers jk :thumbup: