Wild vs Wild bred

[africandiscus]

I am seriously considering getting wild discus. I have been offered by an importer wild bred for sub $100. She is going to come back to me of the strains available.

Both parents are wild caught, but the siblings are tank bred. At the moment she is sourcing wild tank bred heckles for sub $200

She tells me the advantages of wild tank bred are:

1. Water parameters (not much of a shock since they were born and live in tanks)
2. Less complications with disease

Would like to hear comments

[dreamer]

i wouldnt mind some wilds for that price ....

[africandiscus]

As soon as I get a reply on the strains, I will let you know

[kevkoi]

Tank bred heckels?? Hmmmm... who are we kidding? Tank bred heckel hybrids... yes, they can be gotten. Pure heckels, tank bred.... errrm, errm... WHERE??? Rare as hens teeth.

:wink:

[weird]

Same place where prime comes from Kev, as I described in an earlier post. Bred by the elders in tanks attended by the naked amazonian virgins. :lol: :lol: :lol:

well psx2doctor said it was a "she" that is getting back to him.

j/k

Wow, tank bred wilds, this sounds really interesting. You surely will generate alot of interest here, psx2doctor.

[Budi_Armyn]

Kevkoi,
I'm certainly aggree with you! In Indonesia, never heard success story of breeding pure heckel vs heckel. Heckel cross or hybrid, yes we have some. Three-Four years ago, a Marlboro vs Heckel cross win the Grand Champion of Indonesian Discus Contest. Of course the fish is very unique, a clean and bright Marlboro based colour with black vertical bar in the middle of the body.
I saw in book written by Johny Yip (Asian Discus), there is a Korean breeder who is specialized in producing Heckel Cross and the fish is very beautiful.

regards,


budi armyn

[DiscusMan]

After hearing the comments about breeding wilds. I wonder is this importer in Australia or from overseas.

Wayne

[dreamer]

tank bred wilds are not that 'uncommon' but cant say the same for tank bred heckel v heckel. wild brown is the easiest wild to breed in tank :p

either way im still interested in wilds :D

kev, maybe its time for sls to do special on wilds :wink:

[africandiscus]

These fish are coming from Malaysia. I don’t know what wilds are available. It may just be browns and all the others that are easy to breed in captivity. I made a request to see if heckles are available.

If you look at simply discus forum, there are people in there with photos of heckles that have bred with other strains in captivity.

I know nothing about heckles, except for how difficult they are to breed in captivity. I spoke to Mia at Trans Aquarium, she said she used to get heckles and other wilds, but there is no demand. People prefer all the fancy colour

I will be getting a response mid January and will keep this forum updated.

[kevkoi]

Wilds are a nightmare where I'm concerned. Fish are expensive, freight is even more so!!

Can't compare with places like Singapore where they can buy direct from South America. Our "wild" fish have to come thru an intermediary like Germany where they need to be stabilised and treated for all the diseases. AQIS will not allow the direct importation of wild fish from South America into Australia.

Next thing is that many of the wilds come in very bad shape... pinched head, skinny and generally poor condition. There is a big risk in the quarantine of fish which are generally touchy to begin with, coupled with a loooooong haul flight from Frankfurt!! Wild discus are also only seasonally available.

Next option is to buy tank bred fish like browns. Trouble is that most breeders in Asia are rather indiscriminate when it comes to breeding. :? U may buy a young fish that looks like it's a brown.... but it's parents may be 2 browns (wildcaught) but from different location!!! This is technically wrong if wild pure species is your aim! They should be either browns from say "Rio Madeira", "Curipera" or some distinctive location. PURITY OF LOCATION IS AS IMPORTANT!!

Even when we try and ask for "Red Spotted Greens" the tank bred ones are very different from the true wildcaught Tefe "Red Spotted Green" Discus. Admittedly there are still many variations of the Tefe RSG, but even if your discus looks somewhat similar to the Tefe RSG in the books, how sure are you that they ARE if you are buying the fish from Asia?

What's it that u are after? A discus that looks somewhat like the wild thing? Or trully guaranteed wild blood? If it is the former, there are lots of browns and "red alenquer" tank breds available. If it's the latter, only way to be sure u are getting what u want is from wildcaughts.

kev

[dreamer]

it seems chances of getting wilds is pretty slim :oops:

setting purity/location for now ... is that possible to get fish with curipera/madeira/heckel 'look' ?

[kevkoi]

If from Malaysia, I would doubt the purity of the strain.... In Malaysia there are only 2-3ppl who import wild discus into the country. I know the only guy who imports wild fish for most of the breeders in Penang. Most of the wilds imported are used as out-crosses. But like I said, the breeders there are after colour and not purity of wild blood. I've been sold supposed "Red Alenquers" F3 which IMO look NOTHING like the wild fish I have now! Nice looking fish nonetheless.... A good friend of mine has 4 of these F3 fish fully grown in his planted tank looking very good! But they look rather very different to the wild caught Red Alenquers I have atm. :wink:

If you want "wild-looking" browns (ie never mind what "location" they are from as long as they look "brown"), these can be bought very very cheaply. SLS can sell these "browns" at 5-6cm for $29.

The whole facination with wild discus is the purity of the strain and the location. Never buy a "wildcaught" fish without a "location". African Cichlid keepers will understand this best.

As an example... the simple electric yellow cichlid:
There is Labidochromis caeruleus "Lions cove" (Electric yellow cichlid most common variety in the hobby), Labidochromis caeruleus "Tanzania" (this fish is deep blue in colour with black bars!), Labidochromis caeruleus "Nkhata Bay" (Sky blue with a hint of yellow in this variant), Labidochromis caeruleus "Cape Kaiser" (this one is WHITE!). They are ALL the same species.... but have variations in colour. It is imperitive that even though they are all the same species, they should be kept apart and not bred together... if one understand the importance of keeping wild strains pure.

Tough ask for discus breeders in Penang. :wink:

If you trully want to keep wild discus, you should be as pedantic and want locations for your fish. Discus from different locations are distinctively different in colour. They should not be mixed if you are a purist. Symphysodon aequifasciata "Curipera", "Jatapu", "Nhamunda", "Rio Madeira..... etc etc.

[kevkoi]

Check this out... Notice the serious collectors and sellers have "LOCATION".
http://www.belowwater.com/fish/wild-discus/

[jim from sydney]

makes one think..........doesn't it :!: :!: :!:

[dreamer]

awwww.... you named all my fave curipera, jatapu, nhamunda, rio madeira errr plus rio negro and nanay arent bad either.

since you have pointed out its HARD to find out the purity of their origin which we all have to agree :) i dont mind getting them without proper location, however, they must look like those in below water or aquatechnics websites.

those fx rsg and red alenquer in many lfs are no where resemble the wild look except they are still discus :p

[kevkoi]

I want a car that looks like a Ferrari F355, but I only want to pay the Hyundai excel price.... so lets make the Hyundai look like a Ferrari ok? :lol: :lol: :lol:

[dreamer]

you cant really make that kind of comparison
ferrari is expensive while hyunday is cheap anywhere in the world.

whilst wild discus although they are not cheap but they are less expensive than many strains in most countries except here.

in other word, in aust you are getting hyunday for the price of ferrari :roll: :roll: :roll:

[DiscusMan]

I would be interested to see a picture comparison of say the fish of an area now to the same area 20 years ago to see how much the fish of the same area have hybridised in the wild.

Wayne

[kevkoi]

:lol: Wayne, check out Aqualog catalogue on wild discus. They have pictures of examples of all these wild fish. Pictures taken over the years. They are quite distinctive.

Hybrids between colour variants may occur in the wild, but they are in very very small numbers. The populations are far enough (sometimes in completely different rivers which never meet) apart that the main body of the populations are distinctive. Natural selection is a very powerful thing, perhaps in the wild, discus of a certain population are precondition to accept their similar looking counterparts?
This has been the case with things like wild endlers livebearers and many african rift lake cichlids.... wild fish of certain populations seek out mates of that population. However as they get more and more tank bred, that selectiveness dissapears and they hybridise easily in aquariums.

If one endevours to start keeping "WILD" discus, then one should endevour to do the "right" thing. READ up about them and understand what the fascination with them is. Otherwise there are lots of cultivated strains already here which we can do our little genetic experiments on. :wink:

Dreamer, wilds are not the most expensive strains in Australia... trust me, there are many many many cultivated forms that command a much much much higher price anywhere in the world. $200 for a 6inch wildcaught brown "Alenquer" is much much cheaper than say a cultivated good quality Leopard Spotted snakeskin discus of the same size (and this is not even close to being the most expensive cultivated form!).... and with the cultivated forms, the freight is much less, the risk of it dying in quarantine remote and they all arrive nice and well conditioned and can be sold the moment they are released from quarantine. With the wilds, we took almost 6 weeks to bring them around to start feeding on prepared food and put on some bulk before even attempting to put them on display at the shop. A lot more work...

And yes, like has been pointed out.... as a business, why would we want to keep bringing in these wild caughts, go thru all the hassles when at the end of the day most discus keepers (which I would say are into the fancy cultured varieties anyway) do not appreciate or understand the significance of keeping them? By all means, if you are REALLY into getting some REAL "Nhamunda" (not some cultivated sort of lookalike), and will make the importation of it worthwhile for us (hey, it's got to be worth our while), I will source you those fish on special order... :wink:

[dreamer]

i didnt say that wilds are the most expensive strains, just steeper than some. there are plenty nice strains out there that im sure will command higher price than wilds .

arent the wilds you got from your supplier should be treated for diseases and stuff and acclimised with before they are sending to you?

maybe we should arrange 'group buy' this may bring the cost/price down :). i'd love to get some nhamunda ... but i cant even afford rio madeira you have on sale. dang ...someone ...buy fish please... :wink:

[kevkoi]

Woo Hoo... find another article online. Good read about "The State of Confusion in Discus Taxonomy". This throws a spanner in the works.... and confuses the whole "wild discus" issue.

http://www.cichlidae.com/articles/a020.php

... and more... It seems it may not be what it seems...

http://www.cichlidae.com/articles/a019.php

[dreamer]

the more reason to forget about the importance of location. like i previously said, im more than happy to get wild even though without location stating where they came from...