What kind of angelfish offspring will my golden veiltail and black koi produce?

[Phil Harding]

What kind of angelfish offspring will my golden veiltail and black koi produce?

I've found my two angelfish have become a breeding pair and are currently nursing some wrigglers on the leaf of an Amazon sword.  Last weekend I found an outlet for any fish I breed.  The shop owner didn't seem to mind that my breeding pair is made up of two different varieties.  I was just wondering if anyone had any idea what the offspring would look like if they survived.

I'm mostly wanting to breed for enjoyment as I find cichlids fascinating to watch rear their young.

Thanks 🙂

Edited November 23, 2021 by Phil Harding
Typo

[Beardedbillygoat1975]

Here’s a rundown of the punnet square for angelfish breeding. http://www.finarama.com/genetics/punnett.htm
Phenotypically The answer is 50% gold, 25% black, 25% hybrid black and 50% of the offspring carrying the gold recessive gene. 
 

[HH Morant]

As Joaquin Andujar once said about baseball, one word says it all - "youneverknow."

[PineSong]

Wow, that golden veiltail is a sharp looking fish. I haven't seen that colorway before. So sparkly. I hope your wrigglers survive and you get the fun of watching that Punnet square come to life. One of my favorite parts of raising fry is seeing what colors they will be.

[anewbie]

You might find this link useful - it is not un-different than what @Beardedbillygoat1975 provided but it is in a different format. Unfortunately it requires that you know the genetics of your existing angelfishes (which can be difficult for the recessive genes covered up by dominant genes).

 

https://angelfins.ca/index.php?main_page=genetics_calculator

[Phil Harding]

On 11/24/2021 at 3:16 AM, PineSong said:

Wow, that golden veiltail is a sharp looking fish. I haven't seen that colorway before. So sparkly. I hope your wrigglers survive and you get the fun of watching that Punnet square come to life. One of my favorite parts of raising fry is seeing what colors they will be.

Thanks! He seems to be getting inkier colours as he matures.  He's also got a really nice pattern on his fins and top of his body that doesn't show in the photo.

The fry are still on the leaf today and are bigger already.  Both the male and female seem to be quite fussy about moving the fry about the leaf.  I was quite surprised to see the female move the eggs to a different plant after I gave the tank a clean/water change at the weekend.  I didn't know angelfish did that.

[Phil Harding]

Yesterday, the female moved the fry back to the original plant again where I think they might have been grazing on the fuzzy algae on the leaf that was chosen.

Today, the fry are free swimming, but if they venture too far, the parents are sucking them up in their mouths and spitting them out again on the leaf.  Fingers crossed that they don't swallow any by accident.

You can clearly see the eyes on the fry now and they look like they've got a mini silver bauble inside. (I think I need to try a proper camera)

Edited November 26, 2021 by Phil Harding
Added photo

[anewbie]

Good parents; the free swimming stage is why a community tanks doesn't work because the parents can't keep up with all the frys zooming away. Don't worry they wont' accidently eat a few. One thing to keep in mind if you remember - in about 3 months post pictures of the fry colouring - the fun part about breeding esp with parents that have unusual markings is seeing what kind of cookies form the cookie jar.

[Phil Harding]

FAIL 😞 When the fry became more free-swimming the parents ended up eating them along with the flake food - Doh!!  I'm tempted to raise the next batch separately, but otherwise, maybe I could try feeding the parents tabs/wafers so that their young don't end up mixed in with the feed.

[anewbie]

Hum that is bad. Also parents do learn over time so they might get better. I usually just steal the wrigglers (let the parents hatch them) since my fishes are in a community tank. The only head ache is hatching live food the every other day for the first couple of weeks. I find after 3ish weeks the frys will readily eat fine dry foods.

[Beardedbillygoat1975]

Most breeders I’ve spoken to give them 3 tries and on the third strike start pulling them. Another thing that happens is they get spooked - some breeders put a towel over the tank to prevent startling them which seems to trigger them to eat the fry. 

[anewbie]

In the community tank i think it took my parents 5 or 6 tries to get them to free swimming (and yes they can guard them well enough to get that far; but once they start swimming it is really difficult for them to track them down AND keep predators at bay. I remember watching them one day and when the female was distracted another male (I have 7 in the tank) calmly swam buy and ate 2/3 of them and then took off before she noticed.

[HH Morant]

It seems to me that nothing is gained by leaving the eggs with the parents, either in a community tank or in a breeding tank.

Why do people want to do that?

 

[Phil Harding]

On 11/29/2021 at 9:02 PM, HH Morant said:

It seems to me that nothing is gained by leaving the eggs with the parents, either in a community tank or in a breeding tank.

Why do people want to do that?

 

The question is, why does someone breed fish? If I was purely trying to breed angelfish for the offspring, I would definitely snip the leaf off and hatch and raise the fry separately.

What I want to do is observe the angelfish raise their own young. I remember years ago, when I bred kribensis, that was part of the attraction. It is tempting to go the easier route though and try to get the hobby to pay for itself a bit.

[anewbie]

On 11/29/2021 at 3:02 PM, HH Morant said:

It seems to me that nothing is gained by leaving the eggs with the parents, either in a community tank or in a breeding tank.

Why do people want to do that?

 

Two reasons; the parents can do the leg work to hatch them et all; second if the parents are able to actually raise the frys they can teach them how to be anglefishes.

[HH Morant]

"What I want to do is observe the angelfish raise their own young. I remember years ago, when I bred kribensis, that was part of the attraction. It is tempting to go the easier route though and try to get the hobby to pay for itself a bit."

That makes sense, @Phil Harding.

My first spawn is 6 weeks old now, and the second one (from a different pair) is 4 weeks old. I know the fry are not going to pay for my hobby, but I think at least they will more than pay for themselves.

I can appreciate the urge to see the natural behavior of the parents raising their young. But in nature, angelfish spawns contain hundreds of fry so that maybe one or two will survive.

Initially, I took the eggs out because they did not have a chance in the community tank and I was curious to see if I could get them to hatch. After they hatched, my urge was to maximize the survival of the fry.

Now that I realize the nature of the commitment - 3 or 4 months to get them to a size to sell, including setting up new tanks, daily water changes, hatching brine shrimp, and multiple feedings daily - I am not sure I will be removing any more eggs.

[anewbie]

I will state for the record that it is hard to get kribs to not raise their young as they are quite good at it; angels it will take a *lot* of patience and time.