Why do people cull some fry? Anyone here NOT cull fry? I mean.. If you've got the room and you're not looking for show fish, then why cull?

Culling in the begging is riding of fish that are massively deformed. Like broken backs, deformed mouths and such.

Then the second and third or even more is most likely the color the fins an such

ive had a few fish like that too.

A few fish like what?

that are deformed. some of my female guppies became hunchbaked when they got bigger. <_<

I will be doing A LOT of culling in my upcoming projects as I must have very specific specimens with very specific traits and colors as well as the best possible bodyshape,finnage,etc.

Culling is done to remove defective fish,fish with bad color or wild coloring,fish traits you dont want or dont need and even to fit the fish to a certain amount of space there are many reasons to cull.

note the aboive post was by me but my gf left her sn signed on and i didnt notice til just now.

I had one fry that I culled two weeks ago because I finally noticed it had a deformed mouth. Sometimes the deformaties don't become noticable until they are bigger. I had to use a magnifying glass during the first couple of cullings.

Yeah a good point I forgot to mention.Its a good idea to use a good magnifying glass as it is difficult to see defects when they are smaller.

Culling as early as possible is also a good idea since it is foolish to waste extra space on sub-par fish when you are trying to raise good quality fish.Culling is a tedious job when there are huge spawns or multiple spawns. But like most things people dont like doing.It has to be done.

Severe deformities are apparent early on (bent backs, swimming problems, fin abnormalities, etc.), but with subsequent cullings when you're looking for shape, color, etc. it's a nice luxury to wait a little longer if you can. Space is a limiting factor here, but fish you earlier would have gotten rid of can sometimes "catch up" and develop into beautiful creatures.

Many people who breed will sell/give away the undesirable fish (sans the ones with severe deformities/problems) rather than kill them. Home aquarists who have their fish spawn but don't want any more fish just remove the eggs rather than wait and kill the fry.

if you have oh say, 50 fry...after your done culling and some have just died on their own, how many are normally left?

How do you cull them? Freeze them? Flush them? I don't have a clue..... interesting.

Jessica

yeah me too jess- ive always wondered. and why is it called "culling" when its really just "killing"?

anyone have any information? im not planning on breeding for a long time...just wondering