The Krib Project

[red kribensis]

Just wondering if anyone has ever heard of a project called the Krib Project and what ever came of it... This is the article I came across last night while doing some research on a project it is pretty interesting.

There are a group of people around Australia who visit my dwarf
cichlid discussion forum and are about to embark on a project called the Krib
project. In this project we are going to try and undertake a breeding
project to try and improve the vigour and colour of a bread and butter
species like the kribensis ( our subject ). We would select krib pairs and
breed them selecting the most colourful and hardy individuals to breed from,
culling the rest and swapping the best of the spawn with the other breeders
around the country ( frieght around Australia is cheap and quick ). At the
moment we are gathering information about inheritance patterns in kribensis.
The kind of things we are seeking is which features of krib are inheritable
traits and which are environmentally influenced traits. Traits like vigour
I don't know whether anyone has noticed but male krib seem to die a lot
just after spawning and are less vigourous than they were say 10 years
ago ), number of ocelli on the tail and dorsal, and intensity of the red on
the bellies of both males and females, the extent of the red on the belly of
the female, the mothering instinct of female krib and the defensive nature
of male krib, are examples of traits we'd like to improve but this is
pointless if we don't know how these traits are inherited. Ultimately we'd
like to tackle one of these traits at a time ( no point trying to improve
all of them at once ) and then breed the improved strains and release them
to pet stores around the country. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

On a related matter - my albino krib pair have recently spawned and have produced about 50 fry, half of which seem to be albino and the other half seem to have the wild type phenotype. Since then I have found
out that albinism in albino krib is a codominant gene. If wild type fry are
produced does this mean they don't carry the albino gene at all
( homozygous ) or aren't my krib parents real albinos ( the male has black
eye spots on his tail and dorsal, not colourless white ones ) ?

Regards,

Simon Voorwinde

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[email protected]
http://thecichlidtank.cjb.net
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[tjudy]

I have not heard about that project, but since it is in Australia I am not surprised I do not know of it.

'Improving' a line of kribs is a matter of perception. Traits that are selected for depends upon the breeder's tastes.

Some challenges to that type of program when dealing with P. pulcher specifically would be:

1) Krib phenotypes are highly variable, and a spawn will produce a wide range of color and spotting patterns.

2) Color is kribs is sex and behavior dependent, especially in females; so it would be hard to say 'this female is this' unless she is allowed to grow to maturity and spawn (unless the only trait being tracked is ocelli).

Some advantages to using kribs are:

1) There are a lot of possible traits to play with.

2) Spawn sizes are large and that is always a good thing when playing with genetics.

3) They are cheap and easy to breed.

I am working with three separate groups of kribs. One is an albino strain, another is a fish farm strain and the third is wild stock from Nigeria. The most variable of the group are the fish farm strain. The male fry from the original pair vary in number of dorsal and caudal ocelli from 0 - 4. The wild adults have 0 ocelli, but a small percentage of their fry do, which tells me that the development of ocelli in a strain starting with wild fish can be developed very quickly.

 

[Adam - Sydney]

I have heard it come up numerous times and every time it comes up Ive heard it didnt work. People lost interest and werent being rewarded enough for their efforts. There are a few people who have line bred the species and there are some beautiful examples around.... but there at lots more bad examples.

Great underated fish though.

Adam

 

[Roach]

I've heard of it a few times but I don't think it ever got off the ground. It was to be started by a few guys in the Blue Mountains area west of Sydney. Most likely hillbilly types dressed in flanelette.:wink:

 

[gingerbeer]

This project happened a few years ago - the board has now closed down. As the quality of kribs in terms of colour had dropped drastically in Aus. a number of hobbyists banded together to improve quality. This involved selective breeding and crossing of lines within the group.

The group decided on a set of characteristics to breed for being colour of belly, and spots on fins.

You can still find kribs around descended from this project.

Dwarfs in aust. are kindof coming back after interest dropped and this board closed.

Steve

 

[red kribensis]

That's great that there are some other people that have heard of it. I have been wondering lately because it seems like there has been such a drastic drop in quality of kribs if anyone would be interested in starting something similar to that here in the US.... Let me know guys what you think.. Thanks

 

[con-man-dan]

Take some credit Ted! This man IS the krib project here in the states lol Definetly knows his west african dwarves. In fact, I have a pair and about 20 fry of the albino strain he speaks of in the fish room right now :biggrin: