When does this end?

[HUKIT]

A club member is advertising these for sale. They’re Glo Red Shortbody Longfin Puntigrus tetrazona(tiger barbs). I will be honest, I personally loathe hybrids and manmade strains of fish but when does the Dr Frankenstein experiments stop? I understand the general ethics of fish keeping as we are all keeping fish in small boxes but the ethical decisions on the manufacturing of these fish is questionable to say the least.

 

[skjl47]

Hello; I tend to agree with you is the sense of not liking some of the hybrid goldfish as pictured. Even before the newest genetic trick (advancements) enabling the splicing (?) of genes from other species to get the glow sort. This gene splicing ability is a very interesting thing however.
Seem i read that the first such gene spliced examples were zebra danios and that there were patents on the offspring. My understanding being the fish could not be breed- raised and then sold for profit. Same sort of thing happens to corn farmers in the sense they have to keep buying seed corn from the companies which came up with the hybrid corn stocks. The member may be infringing on a patent.

As far as what to do about it, I can think of very little to do other than just do not buy them.

The ethics of keeping fish is often hotly debated. I do not know if the hybrid goldfish actually suffer. Watching some of the more deformed ones does look like they struggle.

 

[abominus]

The ethics of keeping fish is often hotly debated. I do not know if the hybrid goldfish actually suffer. Watching some of the more deformed ones does look like they struggle.

This ^^

I was on another fish forum a while back, and a person had posted about his Glowfish suddenly dying. Given the water paramenters were in check, i explained to him that Glowfish are man made, and how their poor genetics can lead to sudden health issues and deaths. But other members dismissed the opinion saying that it was wrong, and i ended up facing a lot of backlash.

 

[Conchonius]

It is ironic that the fluorescent color is the most ethical part of this fish's breeding. The process of inserting GFP or one of its variants is practically harmless and done routinely on zebrafish, with e.g. lox/cre back in the day and CRISPR in modern times. The gene itself has no real long-lasting effects.

But when all is said and done, you end up with one batch of fluorescent fish. How do you get to the point where you can sell them? Well, you inbreed them. And inbreed them. And inbreed them. You may have heard about e.g. neon tetras being fragile because most of the captive population descends from a small number of animals collected from the wild decades ago, with no fresh blood in all that time. GloFish are the same, except even more extreme. It is hardly surprising that shortbody forms and other mutations emerge when their genetic pool is a puddle.

Another practice I find loathsome is the injecting of dyes to fish. It is barbaric and done often in my country, because for some grotesque reason there is demand for it. Parambassis ranga is a beautiful fish that I had wanted to keep for a while, but I have yet to see an animal not injected in the back with a garish dye that will invariably kill it a few months down the line.

 

[troublesum]

I commented on a subject about hybrid fish and was almost ran out of MFK with the backlash

 

[HUKIT]

It is ironic that the fluorescent color is the most ethical part of this fish's breeding. The process of inserting GFP or one of its variants is practically harmless and done routinely on zebrafish, with e.g. lox/cre back in the day and CRISPR in modern times. The gene itself has no real long-lasting effects.

But when all is said and done, you end up with one batch of fluorescent fish. How do you get to the point where you can sell them? Well, you inbreed them. And inbreed them. And inbreed them. You may have heard about e.g. neon tetras being fragile because most of the captive population descends from a small number of animals collected from the wild decades ago, with no fresh blood in all that time. GloFish are the same, except even more extreme. It is hardly surprising that shortbody forms and other mutations emerge when their genetic pool is a puddle.

That’s my take as well. The Glo process isn’t a huge issue as I’ve never seen any data that it declares it decreases a fish’s life. I’m disturbed about all the short body, long fin abomination of these fish.

 

[HUKIT]

I commented on a subject about hybrid fish and was almost ran out of MFK with the backlash

I’m 51 and stopped caring about what people think about me in middle school.

 

[troublesum]

Yes, i also could care less i was just shocked that so many people feel so passionate about creating hybrid fish. I mean i get the FH craze, but to just randomly pick 2 fish willy nilly and breed them is ????
Those look more like goldfish then tiger barbs

 

[Sassafras]

The best reason for doing something is always, "because we can".

 

[HUKIT]

The best reason for doing something is always, "because we can".

Sure the same can be said for murdering someone but when the other thing, in this case the fish’s health/well being taken into consideration.