Discussion of Taiwan Bees / Selective Breeding

[BlueBolts]

It "appears" Taiwan Bee's are kept collectively kept (i.e. BB, KK, WR plus Mischlings) in the same tank, based on video's (youtube), pics of international breeders tanks...etc

New to TB, the recommendation is to obtain the TB genetics within our breeding group, thus creating mischlings etc. Mischling's serves as 2 main positives, Firstly, it carries the TB's genes, and secondly it's ability to produce TB's, thus multiplying and creating a more efficient way of expanding our TB family.

As the TB breeding program grow's, the option is whether to selective breed each TB's on its own (i.e. BB in one tank, KK in another, ....etc..), or keep them in a collective group (i.e. mix of BB, KK & WR).

Would like to open a discussion on pro's/con's, and thoughts.

[Robert]

From my understanding it is only the blue bolt that is a mix of three taiwan bee colours; king kong, blue bolt and wine red. Both King kong and wine red are fairly stable like our red and black bees. Marcus you would know a great deal about breeding blue bolts isolated, from your generation 1 blue bolt x blue bolt what was the outcome? Mixed or pure blue bolts?

[BlueBolts]

It's all generation pending, my BBxBB produces 100% BB, and the KK & WR IS 90-100%. Over the past 2 drop of my KKxKK produce all KK but 1 WR, AND MY WRxWR Produce all WR but 1 KK. This is the result of my selective breeding, but in a mix tank, with the TB's crossing, it'll be a mix batch.

[honcho]

im wondering bout the gene pool.. if you just keep WR with WR and BB with BB would that not shrink the gene pool down thus making them weaker down the line .. or would it be the same if you kept them all together..?

is it safe to say that if u keep adding mishlings from different sources you will eventually strengthen the genes in the long run..?! or at some stage you stop adding mischlings and keep breeding taiwain with taiwan..?

[shrimpsider]

Reducing the gen pool to early in shrimp strains is a problem we do not only see in Taiwan Bee, but also in pure lines (PRL/PBL). Also, Morgana lost most of her 'Crazy Tigers' she has been working on for 2-3 years due to week gen pool, as she selected the shrimp 'too strict' from her own saying.

Week gens are most obvious from slow growth and late fertility. Also, some deformations of the body can be regarded, as balloon heads or a reduced carapax. Most commercial sellers say: ah, it's a bad angle on this photo, OR, the shrimp was okay after the next molt. I still think this topic should be discussed more.

Returning to Marcus' question my opinion is that using Red or Black Bee, as well as mischlings is a good thing to make a line more stable. I only heard one dissenting opinion until now, and it is obvious that the mainstream of breeders mix.

[BlueBolts]

Selective breeding can be such a cruel experience, no doubt all hobbyist feels Morgana's lost :-(

Thanks Imke, your advise and direction is so valuable. I've always have 1-3 Michsling's in each of my TB tank, and do add CRS/CBS/GB into the gene pool. But is there a disadvantage of keeping each of the TB in separate tanks ? Taking into account, that mischling and red black bees are used to strengthen their lines, or does mixing the TB give them an added advantage ?

[shrimpsider]

But is there a disadvantage of keeping each of the TB in separate tanks ? Taking into account' date=' that mischling and red black bees are used to strengthen their lines, or does mixing the TB give them an added advantage ?[/quote']

No, if you can afford and maintain different tanks, it is good to separate by color. Also, targeted mating in an external satellite breeding box is a good thing. Do not focus too much on colors, and be aware that with one targeted mating you work on one attribute. F.e. if your best looking shrimp is extraordinary small, cross with a big healthy shrimp. If it has an excellent fire red body coloration, cross with a shrimp having weak gens in this skin layer. If it shows extraordinary stripes, cross with a shrimp showing no/few stripes.

With the Blue Bolts, you must be extremely careful as some high grade Snow White already have a small gen pool - but I mentioned it before. They very often show rolled up antennae and the 'hunchback' syndrome.

[shrimpsider]

P.S. - what I have forgotten:

Cross black Taiwan with CB

Cross red Taiwan with CR

you will have the color gen stable then already

[Foxpuppet]

I have just gotten my first real Taiwan Bee Shrimp.= from different sources (as add ons/freebies) and actual targeted purchases.

currently have (all juvenile so unsure of sex now)

3 Panda & 3 Shadow Panda from one Known quality breeder

2 Blue Bolt from a Unknown quality breeder

1 Blue Bolt from a known quality breeder

3 BB Extreme from a Very Reliable Breeder

1 WR from Very Reliable Breeder

Unknown quantity of Mischlings (pinto mix) from various sources

 

6x Panda's are in own section of breeding rack.

3 BB are in with Mischlings. 

3 BBX and WR have only just been added so in quarantine 

what would be a suggested way to keep these guys lines strong and healthy while achieving a decent breeding capability to get my numbers up as I'm not going to be in a position to acquire any more TB for some time (cost of other projects)

PS - I really love the Panda's with the Shadow gene. 

[ineke]

Are you planning on keeping colours seperated? Are they already breeding true?

To have a higher chance of Shadow Panda you can add BB to the mix.

Up until the last year or so all the TB colour types were kept together but now people are keeping them separate to get them to breed true to colour.

Depending on what you are looking for first cull out any male Mischlings. Then put male Tb spares in with the female mischlings which then give you your TBM. You will start getting Tb colours in your Mischling tank which you can breed back to each other or to a TB to increase your TB numbers. These TBm( TB from MIschling) and TBMM  (TB from TBM to TBM) should be kept separate from your pure line TB for several generations until you are getting all Tb patterns. Depending on the F number of your Mischlings this could happen quickly or may take several generations. I have F10 Mischlings that bred to each other gave me only TBMM .

With the pure lines you could keep colours separate or to start with let them breed to get your numbers up then take out the various colours and then start to breed them for a true colour line. 

These are my TBM/Taitibee line that came from my mischlings -after 2 generations of being kept seperate they are now breeding 99% true- I very occassionally get a Panda or KK from the RR/WR tank and a snow white from the BB tank . The pandas and KK breed true 100%. However I have chosen not to mix these with my pure strain of TB -there are fewer and fewre pure Tb around they all seem to have pinto gene so where possible breeders should try to keep a tank with just pure TB in my opinion.

Edited March 9, 2016 by ineke

[Foxpuppet]

Thanks ineke for the info. That was a very nice break down and easy to get my head around. I think I'll try to keep the pandas true for now and let the others mix. Once I have a few More of them then I'll experiment crossing a panda female with the others.

[Disciple]

Great advise. Keep us updated

[Jo]

Ok, so reading this thread, it raises a question that's been bugging me for a while (sorry if this counts as a thread hijack).  Is there any way to tell what a shrimp is by looking at it rather than breeding it and checking the offspring?  I understand that there are going to be recessive traits that can't be seen so I guess what I'm asking, is say I have 2 shrimp and both are shadow pandas, would there be any difference in look between them if one was a TBM and one was a pure TB?  Or if one was a TB and the other was a TTB?

This might be a stupid question but I've never had mischlings and I only have TTB instead of pure TB now, so I'm not sure what anything else would look like.

[ineke]

Jo no question is a stupid question when it comes to shrimp. 

Very simply there is no discerable difference between a pure TB and a TB with mixed genes -we are not talking about the mischlings now it's the shrimp with the TB colours. 

If you put a pure TB next to a TBM or TB with Pinto genes or a Taitibee TB you would not be able to tell the difference -and there in lies the problem. You really need to trust the person you are buying from and they need to have kept their shrimp seperate for several generations if they bought them from someone else. I have identical shrimp in my hybrid and pure TB tanks. Infact I have gone to the trouble of having them on separate sides of the room so they can't climb out and into the next tank -yes that has happened with my Tibees they like to go walk about!!!

At one time it was acceptable to put your TBM into  a pure tank once they had bred true for a few generations but as they can still occassionally throw a mischling it is best not to mix them. My Taitibee Tb breed 99% true now but I still won't mix them but that's me others may not be quite so committed. 

[Jo]

Thanks @ineke, that's what I was thinking.  It makes me glad that whilst they never seem to throw out any TTBs any more, my TB tank will probably never be 100% pure and so I don't need to stress out about whether other people are correct when they sell me pure TBs :)

Good thing I've got such a fixation on stripes!