Swordtail Question PLEASE HELP! THANK YOU?

Question

I have a male green neon and a female red swordtail.My female swordtailis pregnant so I was wondering what color will the fry be?

male neon swordtail not green neon tetra

Female red swordtail not female red molly

I guess you must been mistaken.

male green neon swordtail,sorry!

Answer 1

This mainly will have to do with the genes of your parenting fish. Most fish will engage in sexual reproduction combining the females egg with the sperm of a male, sharing with each other a set of chromosomes. The offspring will contain half of the chromosomes from the male and the other half will be donated by the female, just like in humans. We study how the chromosomes mix and call this recombination.

Bright colours in males tend to be passed along only to male offspring, in other situations traits can be found equally across males and females, but one trait may be more dominant than the others.If a homozygous fish (purebred) set of fish produce offspring traits such as a fish with a dominant white gene with another with a dominant red gene, will accumulate both traits, and not obtain any over the other.

Ie: Black fish mating with white fish producing grey offspring.

Now if you have the example above of white and red fish mating and producing offspring that would come out with a dominant gene of red would suggest that the 2 fish are heterozygous, or often refered to as inbred, though this is untrue(The parenting homozygous fish are capable of creating more heterozygous offspring with a homozygous mate.), and although the fish would have a red phenotype (how it looks) it has a genotype of the white fish (Genetic makeup).

If you crossed 2 fish, both being heterozygous for the red/white phenotype, one of every 4 offspring will come out heterozygous, despite the parents were homozygous. This is shown as:


####R - w
________________
R | RR - Rw
____________
w | Rw - ww
________________

Spawning two homozygous fish with one the dominant red phenotype and the other dominant white phenotype, this instance shows how a red fish will carry a white fishes genetic makeup with a red phenotype.



####w - w
________________
R | Rw - Rw
____________
R | Rw - Rw
________________


And if you breed a homozygous fish with recessive white gene with a heterozygous fish for a recessive red gene, the offspring produced will generally come out as homozygous for the recessive trait, and would be white while the other half of the offspring will be heterozygous for the dominant red gene.


####R - w
________________
w | Rw - ww
____________
w | Rw - ww
________________

In rare cases during fertilization the genetic code of one of the fish becomes damaged, we call this genetic mutation. Mutations result from exposure of the gametes to environmental changes, radiation or other actors. Generally it is common rule that genetically mutated fish have teriminal handicaps and will not survive to adulthood.

Natural selection allows us to filter out recycling of genes which allows for less mutations. Often you will be forced to cull fish which show signs of genetic mutation. If your fish shows any of the following signs, it is your responsibility as an aquarist to cull the fish.

Spinal deformity
Bent or shortened opercula (gill covers)
Any fish with airbladder defects at birth (belly sliders)
Bent or distorted fin rays
Distorted body or head shape (Pugnose)

By performing cullings you will maintain superior genetic material for your fish to parent new ones.

Fish wich are born in captivity obtain genetic code from their parents who have adapted to captivity, allowing them a greater lifespan than wildstock. This is called domestication.

So to sum it up...

Without knowing the genetic origin of the parenting fish, there is no efficient method of determining the colour your fry will be before they are born and mature to develop colour pigment, this also can take quite a long time in certain species, swordtails though will show colour after 6-8 weeks of life. But you have the finger paints to build yourself a picture.

Answer 2

Your neon and swordtail will not cross-breed. The swordtails are able to carry sperm for long periods of time, and give multiple births from one packet of sperm. So your female red swordtail may give birth to similar coloration fry, but if she was in a tank of different types of swordtails, then her fry may be different colours which is not likely. Please buy a floating v trap which only costs less than 8 bucks at the petstore and it'll keep the young fry from it's mother mouth which she'll find appetizing.

Answer 3

I'm guessing you mean a green swordtail and not a green neon tetra, right? If you have a green neon tetra, it cannot breed with your red swordtail.
If you have a green molly, some of the babies will be green and the rest will be red.
If you DO have a green neon tetra and are certain your molly is pregnant, then she is likely pregnant from when she was for sale at the petstore - so it will be a surprise what you get :)

Answer 4

I even have some with my swordtails and mollies and in no way did have a topic different than once I have been given an ick outbreack then certainly one of my frogs died. O and that they in basic terms strengthen to approximately 3 inches so do no longer complication approximately loosing fish.

Answer 5

hope that helps