Loaches Online Forum

what is the real argument here?
Genetic purity in loaches?

Sorry but we as humans have messed with the genetics of every animal we've raised. Why bring up this argument now?

This is a free market.. Buy hybrids if you want. Buy wild breeds if you want.

mistergreen wrote: This is a free market.. Buy hybrids if you want. Buy wild breeds if you want.

That's all very well, but these fish are not being listed/sold as hybrids, but instead being underhandedly passed off as genuine 100% pure species. Serious loach enthusiasts may be able to spot the difference, but many will not. The fish they buy in good faith as Botia almorhae for example, may turn out to have mixed genes, such as the ones coming from Czech at the moment that clearly contain B. striata genes or similar.

Emma

mistergreen wrote:what is the real argument here?
Genetic purity in loaches?

Sorry but we as humans have messed with the genetics of every animal we've raised. Why bring up this argument now?

This is a free market.. Buy hybrids if you want. Buy wild breeds if you want.

One more sane man!
Chromobotia macracanthus, generically clean and in a nature probably for a long time already is not present

oliv, , like Emma has wrote why do the exporters from your country and the Czech not put on their list that these are hybrids,
instead they send them over as very young fish which look like the fish you want until it starts growing into frankensteins creation.

mick
ps if this was done in the UK, they would end up being sued for such a practise.

mickthefish wrote:oliv, , like Emma has wrote why do the exporters from your country and the Czech not put on their list that these are hybrids,
instead they send them over as very young fish which look like the fish you want until it starts growing into frankensteins creation.

mick
ps if this was done in the UK, they would end up being sued for such a practise.

Clearly, and how the rights of the man and freedom of actions?
Anything criminal I in it do not see, the fish is sold from a farm under the mark sp. much more cheaply, and your English wholesale intermediaries deceive faster all already
I very much value the clients, from me simply next time will not buy, it it is not necessary

i'll agree that some agents are unscrupulous but not all.
as to a sp iv'e seen some lists and it stated a specific name, eg: granulosus or petricola,
but there's no mention of a X sp or what the parentage is.?

mick

mickthefish wrote:i'll agree that some agents are unscrupulous but not all.
as to a sp iv'e seen some lists and it stated a specific name, eg: granulosus or petricola,
but there's no mention of a X sp or what the parentage is.?

mick

Dear, anybody also will not tell to you it, it is a trade secret of any farmer, sometimes to desirable result it is necessary to go through crossing even of several kinds during several generations

OK granted it's a secret that they want to keep, but the same question why are they not listed as crosses?.

mick

mickthefish wrote:OK granted it's a secret that they want to keep, but the same question why are they not listed as crosses?.

mick

Not absolutely has understood a question, in sense is not specified what it is a hybrid, instead of the kind which is not determined?

Just to clarify what Mick is asking, why do they label hybrids with pure breed nomenclature.

For instance, why do they, whoever they are, label a B. histrionica x B. almorhae hybrid as just b. histrionica?

The aquarium trade is not ready for this, IMO. You'd be astonished to come upon a regular aquarium shop that knew which species of loaches they were selling - I mean, most of these stores are still selling small clowns for small tanks. The informed shops are very few.

Asking a typical shop importer to even care about the pedigree of a given fish is silly in most cases. People who do not have access to truly informed retailers won't have this luxury.

I won't eat genetically modified rice. If the ingredient has a TM symbol after, it puts me off. The whole loach hybrid program continues to seem self-indulgent and speculative at best. It does not matter whether people like Oleg are making money at it to me. It's the vivisection of it all that I find repulsive.

As always, human beings misuse science to find out how they can warp the natural world. The knowledge and careful practice put into all of these experiments would be FAR more useful in breeding healthy pure bred stock for replenishing the world's rivers. Not just loaches, too.

As the planet's fish stocks die off - food fish, aquarium fish, all those fish that merely support their ecosystems and aren't good for the plate or the aquarium - people will still try to play God in their secret laboratories. The waste of effort and knowledge is typically human.

The physiological understanding of loaches, too, is wasted. Why is Oleg not poking around Russian streams and rivers? Where is the new material that is actually discovered? Here, we wait for years for answers nobody wants to hear. His energy would be better spent discovering a new loach - and they are out there - rather than trying to invent a new one in his kitchen coffee maker.

Oleg's stubbornness in this matter is interesting to me. I cannot imagine being compelled by such an experiment, particularly in the light of so much obvious dissent.

I watch car crashes like anyone. I will crane my neck to see the details. And so I am interested to see what Oleg comes up with. But I do not think the hobby is in peril for lack of stock with non GM pedigree. It's just another facet of the loach hobby that we all have to educate our suppliers about.

If you're importing fish from SE Asia, maybe SE Europe is not a good source. If you're buying fish for a potential loach tank, make it your business to force the supplier to be informed.

I made an agreement with my loaches that I would not eat them. They are pure-bred, wild-caught fish. I made an agreement with my stomach that I would not eat genetically modified food. Somewhere it all balances out.

Mark in Vancouver wrote:
I made an agreement with my loaches that I would not eat them. They are pure-bred, wild-caught fish. I made an agreement with my stomach that I would not eat genetically modified food. Somewhere it all balances out.

heh. Are you 100% sure you're not eating modified food? And it's ok for your beef to eat the GM food but not you? And it's ok for you to wear GM cotton? hmmm..

And cross breeding/ hybridizing is not the same as genetically modified.
The grains, vegetable, fruits you eat have been hybridized hundreds if not thousands of years ago.

thanks MG, you've put it better than i could.

mick

Everyone has the right to own opinion

To give out of hybrids at sale for the present kind it is very bad
In Russia of the price on hybrids very low, because thoroughbred roads and many do not have opportunity to buy
To basic weight of the people which the houses a decorative fish, absolute all the same contain, if only it was beautiful and cheaply
The farmers can not buy thoroughbred kinds owing to their inaccessibility, therefore all and occurs

2Mark in Vancouver
To me now writes many people, everyone want to buy of hybrids, why?

mistergreen, it can be very difficult to eat 100% GM free food. if mark wants to try his best, and avoid eating it where he knows its GM, then i think that is about as good as anybody can do. the beef cows dont get to choose if they eat GM food or not. here it is possible for farming and food companies to buy in 1 load of certified GM free food so they can get their certificate, then buy food with GM ingredients for the rest of the year, and still get away with selling the food as GM free. food regulation is insane.

cross breeding, hybridising and genetic modification are all separate, different proceedures. you probably wouldnt realise that bread may be made with synthetic wheat. synthetic wheat is not produced by genetic modification, but could be considered similar, and as its not GM, no need to label on ingredients list