The Dark Future of Captive/Farmed Raised Fish

As many of us know, guppies are no longer the hardy fish that people used to associate with around 10 years ago. Constant inbreeding in the farms have resulted their genetics to become less diverse, resulting higher chance of disadvantageous recessive genes to become expressive among the next generations. Apart from obvious external defects like deformed spine, it can also cause defects that we cannot see from outside such as weaker immunity.

Ofcourse, guppies aren't the only subject to inbreeding in the farms. I think many, if not, most farmed raised fish are inbred to some extent. However, because guppies reproduce faster than the other fish (They reproduce more than the other livebearers.), we can see the impact of inbreeding earlier than the other fish. It is said that it only takes 11 generations for guppies to mutate.

Looking at what's happening to guppies, it is likely that the same thing will happen to the other farm-raised fish in the future. Expect more farmed raised fish to become weaker and less immune. On the internet, I've seen many reports from American fishkeepers that neon tetras have become less hardy than they used to be. If the trend continues, then neon tetras and the other hardy fish will no longer be the popular beginner's/aquascapers' choice. As the result, there will be less option for beginners to choose and therefore, less people will get interested in fishkeeping and this can cause more people to stop farming fish, causing supply to become rarer. Less supply leads to more expensive fish and it can lead also make people capture more wild fish which can threaten the ecosystem. For instance, if supply for farmed raised neon tetras have become rare enough, then people will start taking more neon tetras from the wild habitat to sell, especially because the price have become more expensive due to the rarity in the farm.

I wish there's something that we can do about it, especially for those who breed fish. I'm thinking of building ponds that constantly receive fish from different farms in order to reduce inbreeding.

 

Inbreeding is only a problem if the population in question has detrimental recessive genes. Those are what cause issues like a deformed spine. Eventually, survival of the fittest will weed those genes out of an inbred population. There are a lot of animal populations in the wild that frequently inbreed and have very few issues with bad recessive genes because there just aren't any anymore. It does make a population less adaptive, but that's not a problem for animals kept as pets.

 

It's more along the lines of the farm raised fish being fed some many antibiotics and other medicines to keep them healthy in extremely overcrowded setups that makes it hard to get them in healthy. If the original fish are healthy then the following generations of fish normally are good. And guppies reproduce at the same time line as larger livebearers do they just have smaller mouths so they cannot eat the fry as long as species like molly can.

 

Your concerns are why many people prefer to buy their fish from fellow hobbyist / breeders .
Most of the hobby breeders truly care about quality over everything else ..
Mcasella also made very good points I agree with .
I know I haven't needed medication in my fish room for years as I don't treat fish and besides greed don't know why other breeders would . You can't breed a fish that was once sick IMO and should certainly never sell them . Or at least I never would ??
Most keepers true dilemmas come from buying poor stock right off the rip IMO .
Inbreeding is not the cause of issues really IMO..It is poor keeping/ raising by farms IMO ..

 

Your concerns are why many people prefer to buy their fish from fellow hobbyist / breeders .
Most of the hobby breeders truly care about quality over everything else ..
Mcasella also made very good points I agree with .
I know I haven't needed medication in my fish room for years as I don't treat fish and besides greed don't know why other breeders would . You can't breed a fish that was once sick IMO and should certainly never sell them . Or at least I never would ??
Most keepers true dilemmas come from buying poor stock right off the rip IMO .
Inbreeding is not the cause of issues really IMO..It is poor keeping/ raising by farms IMO ..

I will say having parasites (like ich) are completely different from the fish having a serious disease or genetic issue (like columnaris or shortened spine deformity). The parasites normally can be fixed pretty easier which genetic issues will show up long term and diseases that often require antibiotics or serious medication can affect the fish long term as well.