I have a question more about general genetics than about the 'parenting gene': have any of you observed occurrences of "unwanted" recessive traits? I'm not even sure what those would be, maybe just a freakish deformity, or maybe a behavioral problem. The reason I ask is, from my limited understanding of genetics, the law of averages suggests an appearance of reinforced recessives when you cross individuals with closely-related genes. In other words, siblings. (Which is probably the origination of our deeply-ingrained cultural taboo against incest.)
Does this happen in aquarium-raised fish, or have any 'negative' recessives bred out of the genus by now? The fish I have are within a couple generations of wild-caught, so I guess it's not really a concern for me, but what about you folks with colonies of 5-10 generations' depth?
And one more question: does anyone know the statistics on the occurrence of genetic mutations? This is food for thought, in any discussion of breeding, as the 'bad' mutations in the wild are culled out, while they are given a chance to survive under more 'civilized' conditions. (I think someone pointed this out already.)
cheers
-Andrew