Thursday 24 June 2010

Question: HM cross HMPK always result in HM

> will all my fry become HM if father HM and mother HMPK? all of them long fin?

Depends. Many people believe that halfmoon genetics involve multiple genes. So, if you cross 2 halfmoons (either HM or HMPK), theoretically you will get some halfmoons. Now, the percentage of halfmoons in your fry depend on the goodness of quality of their parent genes. These days, if you have good eyes in picking pairs, you most definitely can get around 80% halfmoons in the spawn. Note: some breeders only quote the percentage on their males, others include the females as well. We typically count both males and females.

Failing to choose good breeders will yield to....Super Deltas and Deltas. In fact, in the early days of halfmoon development, it is common to get SDs from any halfmoon pairings that you do, irrespective how wonderful the parent fish were! Over the time, the gene pool of halfmoons in bettas getting better and better thus increase in your chance of getting halfmoons as well. You will still get SDs fry if new gene pool is introduced to either of your parent fish (e.g. one of the parents being crossed to non-halfmoon line).

There are lots of ways to increase tail spread including crossing with DT, rosetail, feathertail, and of course a fish with lots of branching. Note that you can get a betta which is rosetail DT or a DT with lots of branching and yet not a rosetail nor feathertail.

As for the fin length. Yes, majority will have longer fins, longer than plakad if that's what you meant by long-fin. The length of the fin depends heavily on the parent's HMPK gene. If the HMPK were a cross from an HM, then you can expect a standard long-fin fry. However, if the female HMPK comes from a pure HMPK lines (assuming it has never been crossed to HM line), then your fry will have a medium long-fin. A medium long-fin is typically longer than your standard HMPK, but not-as-long compared to a full HM fin. Lots of people collapse this category as simply long-fin. We'd rather call them medium-fin for clarity (do you get offended when people refer to SD as HM?)

It is safer to assume that the fin length outcome is the result of permutation of the parents' fin. So, you get 25% HM, 50% medium-fin, and 25% HMPK. So, in majority (75%) you will get short-fin and those medium-fin fry which look very much like short-fin ;)

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