Beyond F1- Where are they?

Everything you ever wanted to say about "Zebra luvin", but didn't because you thought everyone would take the mickey! Plus general topics for discussion including everything from what you feed them to your personal experiences.

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TwoTankAmin
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Beyond F1- Where are they?

Post by TwoTankAmin »

In recent months we have all seen scores of wc zebras offered for sale at ever dropping prices. There have been forum threads on a number of sites discussing the future of not only zebras but other hypans also banned for export by Brazil.

Has anybody not read a post rumoring about secret captive breeding programs on the verge of unleashing 1,000s of zebras onto the market from places as far away as Asia or a close as Brazil iteself?

The hoopla never seems to end.

What I want to know is there anybody out there who now has F2 or F3 fry? If all the stories, or at least some of them were true, would we not see breeders offering F2 or F3 fish? I have taken rosy barbs, montezuma swordtails and bristlnose plecos to F3 my tanks, but I am still working to get just a single F2 zebra spawn.

If zebra plecos are so plentiful, so easy to raise and keep and so easy to spawn as some folks contend, where are all the F2 and F3 zebras?????
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coralite
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Post by coralite »

I hear what you are saying TTA. I think the big difference between L46 and many other fish is the long time it takes to grow specimens to maturity. I havent spawned H. zebra yet but my research seems to indicate that it takes up to three years to mature a female and up to five years to mature some males. As much as I fancy the idea of making my own F2 of any fish species, with zebras I might be inclined to sell the offspring and keep the mature pair as long as they are producing viable young.

On the other hand, surely some pleco breeders must have reached f2 and perhaps f3 but they were uncertain about the origin of their fish when purchased at an LFS. I suspect this happens more often in the UK and Europe where there seems to be a lot more effort spent in breeding L46, and the higher numbers of CB fish which get sold to the fish store.
it's not in my nature to be mysterious, I just can't talk about it and I can't say why.
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