A LITTLE INFO ON KOI / GOLDFISH HYBRIDS

[Craig58]

I think most of the ones in your pic are ghost koi. I have always liked them a lot.

That doesn't surprise me they started out brown.

Scale wise, that's different then color. They don't grow in scales. They were always there from birth. They just aren't that noticiable at a young age. As they grow, the scale definition becomes more visible and if the colors change, they can stand out more.

Craig

 

[capewind]

I can understand the colors being as layers, but still confused. Will check out the link. The ones with the bigger scales tho.... they had tiny scales when smaller, and the big scales came in black? I have a few matsubas but at the time these guys were hatched, nothing with scales like this. Normal scales, and the dotsui row of scales down the back (no other scales on that fish).. the doisu is the one in my avatar (when younger)...

 

[capewind]

Missed part of what you were saying... so as the tiny scales grew, would it be safe to say the black pigment was expressed???

 

[koiguy1969]

Just an FYI - Koi usually don't get more color as time goes on. Goldfish can and will.

Koi typically lose color with only a few exceptions.
If koi are brown, they'll tend to stay brown. They might get prettier but that is usually because the scale pattern adds interest as the Koi gets bigger. Or as they grow, small amounts of color become more obvious and distinct. I.e. it was always there. Sometimes black can fade and unmask a color underneath.
Red almost always tends to fade with age and never just appears. The higher quality koi are those with strong reds that don't fade out.
Black can do a bunch of different things and can fade with age, get stronger with age, even change with temperature.

But the reds/oranges usually don't get stronger. They usually fade and can even disappear totally.

So if you see color appearing in them, especially red, I'd say that's the goldfish side, and not the koi side.
If they have barbels and are getting color as they grow, (and not black just fading thus exposing an underneath color), I'd say that was pretty unusal.

As with anything, and especially when it comes to color in koi, anything is possible!

I'm sure that the "things heard" have been based at one time on something scientifcally done but now it's consdiered common knowledge maybe in the scientfic fish communtiy so why would anyone set up an experiment today to look at this. Especially if you are going to get mostly brown, unsaleable fish!

So I think we are counting on you to now to recreate an experiment and put it on line!

Craig

Each Koi is born with a fixed number of chromataphores which remains relatively constant throughout its life. As Koi age and grow, these chromataphores have to cover a larger area of skin; therefore, there is a tendency for the coloration to become paler (due to the chromataphores becoming less dense) or to fragment. This helps to explain why many stunning young Koi are not as attractive when they are slightly larger. Buying young fish from a known "high quality bloodline" usually means you are buying fish with more dense chromataphores, which results in color remaining even when the Koi has grown.

some varieties (e.g. Sanke and Showa) it is common for the pattern to change considerably as the fish grows due to the surface color fragmenting and revealing a deeper, different color

*An excerpt from the article "The United Colors of Koi" by David Pool, Ph.D., Tetra.

 

[Waterbug]

You know I keep reading that Hybrids don't have wiskers and are sterile, Well I will have to argue at least 50% of that, I have more than one Hybrid that has whiskers,

I agree. Even when 2 Koi breed it's not 100% certain all the offspring will have whiskers, or 2 eyes or the right number of fins. Hybrid just throws more variables into the mix.

and really wanting to try and see if I can get one to spawn back just to prove that hybrids aren't 100% sterile. I can't prove that all are sterile or not, and many say they are, but I do have some doubts.

Anyone saying 100% sterile would be underestimating mother nature. Smarter to just say sterile. Mules are considered sterile, but a couple of females have had offspring when mated with a donkey or horse. But it would be interesting to know how common sterility is in Koi-Goldfish hybrids.

 

[koiguy1969]

a forum discussion on the subject..... http://www.goldfishkeepers.com/forum/showthread.php?t=341

 

[Craig58]

I can understand the colors being as layers, but still confused. Will check out the link. The ones with the bigger scales tho.... they had tiny scales when smaller, and the big scales came in black? I have a few matsubas but at the time these guys were hatched, nothing with scales like this. Normal scales, and the dotsui row of scales down the back (no other scales on that fish).. the doisu is the one in my avatar (when younger)...

You might not have any fish "like" them but the genes for those scale patterns were in the parents all along. You just by chance had a breeding where some of the babies inherited the right genes from each parent to actually express the scale pattern. It's why we have such a variety in Koi today, there are a lot of genes involved and sometimes they get expressed, sometimes they don't. You never truly know what you're going to get until the grow out. Even if the same two fish are bred over and over, each batch will be different with different markings. You might get some consistency with some things, but never everything.

It's why top quality koi breeeders are ruthless. For every Koi they keep and grow to 2-3", there are probably 10-20 on the compost pile. For every one they grow to 24", there are probably a thousand they tossed in the trash or sold off to pet stores and pond stores.

In your babies, yes, they always had tiny scales. Then the scale grew as the fish grows. And it became more obvious. And as the grew, the very thin color on top was spread out across the scale to the point it is almost invisible. Thus showing the black underneath.

Think of it in the reverse of painting a black room. To cover the black paint, you need several layers of white to not be able to see it. Now lets say we could stretch out that wall. Each piece of the white paint would be stretched as well making it thiner and thiner in any one spot. But the black underneath is very deep in the wall. In fact the material of the wall is black so the black never getrs thinned out. Eventually, if you stretch the wall enough, you'll start to see the black underneath again. Stretch it out to 10 or 20 times it's original size and the white is so thin, it's not even hardly there anymore and the wall looks black again. But in some places maybe the white is a little stronger, so maybe that will look gray now, or dirty white instead of black or white.

This is what is happening with Koi all the time as they grow. Colors come and go. But in koi where there are not different colors in the different layers of skin and scales, you get a solid strong color that won't change as the fish grows. That's what they mean when the Koi breeders say they are looking for strong, deep colors. They want the wall that is made from black material, not just a color painted on top that can fade.

Craig

 

[capewind]

Thank you Craig! Stretching the wall made a lot of sense. I think what confuses me the most is I *DO* have basic understanding of genetics in the regards to dominant and recessive traits, but they are applied somewhat differently than in fish from what I am understanding. We used to breed/show both Persian cats, and in dogs, Mastiffs.

To OVERLY simplify, in solid color Persians for example, the genes are sex linked, and white, while visible as a color, really is invisible, and is "masking" either red or black, either as a dominant (red or black) or as a dilute (cream or blue). If you were to breed a black queen, to a red stud, you are only going to get red or black kittens (dilute is only possible if one or both parents carry the dilute gene), and the gender will be linked. The female kittens would be red, and the male kittens would be black. Even if a grandparent was a parti color, you will NOT produce a parti color kitten from this pairing.

Now in the Mastiffs... If you bred a red (apricot) to a red (apricot), obviously, you could get apricot puppies, but you could also get the dilute cream (fawn) coloring as well. In this case, the fawn gene is most dominant within the breed. But if you bred fawn to fawn, both dilutes, you could NOT get an apricot, the dominant form of red. Breeding apricot to fawns, easy to understand you could get both apricots and fawns. In the Mastiff breed, there are also brindles. No way possible to get a brindle puppy unless one of the parents happend to be a brindle. The brindle gene has two alles, as a multi color gene, and both genes need to be present to be reproduced.

So while slightly different, both in the Persians and Mastiffs, there is gene predictably that I am having a hard time stretching to include fish. What I am grasping of the fish is they can express color combinations going back to say the 3rd or further generations??? OR am I totally losing the grasp here, and would it be simplified that the fish's gene pool hasnt been manipulated as tightly as per se the dogs have been, so fish are still more of a wild card in expression???

 

[Craig58]

So while slightly different, both in the Persians and Mastiffs, there is gene predictably that I am having a hard time stretching to include fish. What I am grasping of the fish is they can express color combinations going back to say the 3rd or further generations??? OR am I totally losing the grasp here, and would it be simplified that the fish's gene pool hasnt been manipulated as tightly as per se the dogs have been, so fish are still more of a wild card in expression???

I think the simple answer is yes. :razz:

I don't think the color in fish is as simple as dogs,cats, people, (blue eyes vs,. brown eyes), etc.. There are so many variables it seems and I don't think anyone will claim to really understand it all. I wouldn't be surprised if with the right breeding you find traits and colors going back 20 or 30 generations. Obviously you'll get predominately a certain "type" of fish from any given breeding. But anomalies might appear and might not.

I think in fish the difference is the transparancy in the skin. In animals a hair is black, or red, or white, or tan, etc...I.e. it is solid from end to end. Dog and cat colors are usually a blend of hairs. Color is mostly two dimensional. A hair color and a pattern. In fish the colors can overlay each other. If you think of animals as stainglass windows with 4 primary colors. You control type of color and placement of color for a large number of possible vairations. In some breeds only two colors are possible. Others three. Some 4.

In fish, you have stainglass windows stacked on each other each able to use all 4 colors. If you have three panes of red stacked on each other you'll get a strong red. You happen to stack two reds and a black on top you'll get black. But stretch out the top pane of glass, thin it out as the fish grows and the red starts to show. Now your talking about making a design in 3D not 2D so the possibilties explode.

The Koi breeders I have talked to have said it's simply a numbers game. They breed to get thousands, if not tens of thousands of babies. Then they start handselecting them. The skill of a top breeder is usually in their abilty to cull through the 1-2" babies and find the best. The rest become fertilizer.

You have a chance to bred a top champion in your pond every spring. It's very unlikly cause of the genetics you start with for most backyard ponders. But even a home pond stocked with all champions may not produce any champions at all. Because the home ponder might only get a few hundred fry to start with each year and they might only have the facilities to grow out 4-5 each year. So the numbers game is against them. Trying to pick a champion from hundred 1" fish is worse then the odds in the worst lottery!

Craig

 

[capewind]

Thank you again. Your analogies are really helpful. Right now I am thinking of stain glass, stretching, transparency, and one baby that is recently making noticable color changes. This baby is only about an inch or an inch and a half now. Caught it (and a twin) a couple weeks ago out in the pond. It was blah brown on top/lighter sides and belly, but had a muddy looking grey/brown blotching over most of its back - head was plain... Now those blotches are starting to look a darker grey, more defined, and it almost looks like the blah brown is starting to lean towards orange... head too is going orange. Guessing its age and when fish were moved around, he can only be koi... (s)he is also butterfly, so it narrows who the parents could be. I do happen to have a male butterfly with near idenical coloring/pattern as what I think this baby is doing. Now its twin on the other hand is growing at the same rate, also butterfly, and is still more blah brown with undefined blotches. If I were a betting person, I would bet it will do what the other is doing now. What I am now picturing is that male butterfly outside, with a brown paint job that keeps getting stretched thinner, more transparent, and thinking of this baby... Doesnt mean he is definately the daddy, as we do have 3 other koi that are black, white and orange (1 male, 2 females) but they are all standard fin, and I dont have any female butterflies out there that could likely be the mom (young or havent been in that pond long enough). Could just be a coincidence that the pattern is the same LOL.

 

[Craig58]

Yep.. who knows! I have had Koi born that when we look at them we are like huh? Where the heck did that one come from! And others that we can say almost right away.."Oh yeah.. that's from xxxxxx."

This year we only had four survive that we have brought into the indoor pond. And all four look like they each came from different Koi in our pond. One is solid orange right now with no markings at 3". I have no solid fish in the pond. So who knows what it'll look like later!

Craig

 

[capewind]

I am trying to understand the basics with the koi, so MAYBE if we have hybrids, I can spot them LOL.

Most of the larger koi babies we have right now, which includes those with the black backs, I am guessing our from our Matsuba standard koi. We had two orange matsubas that were plump with eggs the right time line to when we found them... It's the scale pattern that is throwing me the most tho. AKA recessive in my girls? or a different expression maybe via a dotsui male? Most of those with the black backs have standard fins, but we also have one in particular, who looks likes the ones with standard fins, but is butterfly, and has a stripe of gin rin scales down its back... We do have three gin rin butterflies (not even close to a matsuba coloration) but they are still young (old enough to potentially breed I guess). At the beginning of spring, they were only in the 6-7" range, and now are more to 9-10"... anyway I look at it, I am finding all of this FUN;-)

 

[Craig58]

anyway I look at it, I am finding all of this FUN;-)

That's the most important part!! Otherwise you'll drive yourself nuts if you try to get too serious about it!!

Craig

 

[Dave 54]

What hasn't been said here is the Breeders are having problems with weakend immune systems with their champions they are pure bred and bred from a gene pool that is shrinking .
There was an attempt to introduce new blood some years ago now but nothing really came of it as there were problems with the colours not being bight enough etc .
You mentioned the larger scaled koi or as we say Doitsu koi which were introduced to the Japanese by the Germans many moons ago with these you can get the large scale and leather of no scaled varieties .
If you have fish that belong to the twelve classes of koi , for instance the Sanke but with the large scaled or leather variety then you prefix the sanke with doitsu i;e Doitsu sanke , doitsu showa, doitsu Tancho etc etc.
There is also a thirteenth class which is a catch all class for anything not described in the twelve classes.
Personally I love doitsu koi Carp as this was the fish we acctually started out with .
Some of the leather koi can be quite stunning to look at almost as though they had been spray painted patern wise .

rgrds

Dave

 

[Fishylove]

I have a doitsu, Dave, I call it a Tancho, but I'm not sure if it is a true Tancho because it's back is speckled with black? He s very pretty tho only about 6" now so maybe he will loose some of the black. Also, I got two new koi yesterday, one I think possibly is a showa, but alas I'm don't know for sure lol. I'll try and get pictures of them, I always forget to get pics of them Before I let them go in the qt tank lol.