# Electric Blue Jack Dempsy



## Colton (Aug 9, 2006)

I have now decided to try out the Central american cichlids after having Malawi's for 5 years 
and I got some little Electric Blue JD's and I got them home setup the tank and I went to get a few more to make it 6 to start out with and then a guy told me to breed the Blue JD you have to have 1 of the parants be a E. Blue JD and he said the female or the male has to be a regular
JD that carries the Blue Gene.......does that make any sense?

Thanks for any help!


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## wickidchap (Feb 27, 2009)

Well the process is pretty long to end up with Electric Blue Jack Dempsey's but if thats what you really want this is what you'll have to do. Get one electric blue jack dempsey and one regular jack dempsey and let them breed then grow the fry which will carry the blue gene. Then breed one of the blue genes with an electric blue jack dempsey and thats how you end up up ebjd. Hope I didn't confuse you but thats how its done


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## wickidchap (Feb 27, 2009)

This site should help you understand a little more:

http://bluejax.co.uk/breeding.aspx


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## salukicichlids (Apr 16, 2009)

Yep makes perfect sense. Someone here will probably respond as I have read a number of posts on people doing this and other places. So my information is not on what I have done but what I have read.

Juvi EBJDs are more prone to problems then normal JD. They are a weaker fish. It seems most full grown EBJDs are males.

If you take a male and female EBJD and breed them you will not get full blue EBJDs

So if your planning on breeding EBJDs
1) Grow out a EBJD and well as a JD of opposite sexes
2) When breeding age when the two fish spawn you will be left with JD fry that carry the blue gene
3) Then raise the blue gene fry till they can be sexed
4) Take a blue gene JD and breed it with another EBJD

The end result should be around 50% EBJD, 50% blue gene JD

You could also spawn 2 blue gene dempseys which would result 25% EBJD, 50% blue gene, and 25% regular

This process would be much easier if you just wanted to find someone who already had blue gene JDs

Hope this helped a little and good luck


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## salukicichlids (Apr 16, 2009)

Got beat to it...


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## mlancaster (Jul 24, 2009)

Another note, not from personal experience but from a breeder I met: He said if you breed BGJD x BGJD, as mentioned above, your EBJDs from that spawn will be of a higher quality (health wise and body/fin structure wise) when compared to a spawn of BGJD x EBJD. A spawn of BGJD x BGJD will produce 25% EBJD (as mentioned above) and the remainder a mix of BGJD and regular JD; therefore, the other 75% can only be sold or given away as regular JDs. This information is from a breeder who, in my opinion, had nice looking mature/sub-adult EBJDs.

Thanks,
Matt


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## rmcder (Jul 9, 2005)

salukicichlids said:


> If you take a male and female EBJD and breed them you will not get full blue EBJDs


Not exactly true... You WILL get 100% ebjds with that cross... BUT... No one I know of has ever had these offspring live beyond a few days. Iow, it's not a viable way to breed ebjds.


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## rmcder (Jul 9, 2005)

mslancaster said:


> Another note, not from personal experience but from a breeder I met: He said if you breed BGJD x BGJD, as mentioned above, your EBJDs from that spawn will be of a higher quality (health wise and body/fin structure wise) when compared to a spawn of BGJD x EBJD. A spawn of BGJD x BGJD will produce 25% EBJD (as mentioned above) and the remainder a mix of BGJD and regular JD; therefore, the other 75% can only be sold or given away as regular JDs. This information is from a breeder who, in my opinion, had nice looking mature/sub-adult EBJDs.
> 
> Thanks,
> Matt


A couple comments... Firstly, the bgjd xbgjd cross is very likely to produce better fry imo. However, if you're breeding siblings, I"m not sure you're really gaining anything. The idea is to introduce fresh, healthy genes, and inbreeding is less likely to accomplish that goal.

Similarly, the standard practice of breeding ebjd x jd and then crossing the bgjd fry with the original father is how we got into this fix (weak genetics) in the FIRST place! So although it's easier to do it that way, it's not the way to produce strong fish.

Finally, you say "A spawn of BGJD x BGJD will produce 25% EBJD (as mentioned above) and the remainder a mix of BGJD and regular JD; therefore, the other 75% can only be sold or given away as regular JDs". You should not sell or give away jds that carry the blue gene as "regular jds". They are not "regular", and getting them out into the hobby as simple jds is a bad idea. Note also that, given what I wrote above, bgjds should be in demand for breeding, so, in theory, they should be slightly more valuable than "regular" jds.

Not meaning to be "snarky" here, just some clarification that I think is important.


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## Sprungster (Mar 17, 2008)

I suggest you read:

http://www.elacuarista.com/secciones/tfhblue.htm

http://www.cichlid-forum.com/phpBB/view ... 9a41f8e0be

You can observe my pair, EBJD X JD, producing Blue Gene JDs in order to breed them back with their father:

http://www.cichlid-forum.com/phpBB/view ... p?t=201737

I think that unless you cross different blood-lines breeding BG X BG is not going to improve the quality of the fish. Moreover, as far as I know, EBJD are all linked to Hugo Luzardo's Dempseys, he started breeding them and I am not sure if anyone actually managed to "rediscover" them again. So technically speaking there is only one EBJD bloodline although some genes were lost along the way and it does make a difference whether your EBJD are 10 or 100 generations away from the original EBJDs produced by Luzardo.

In any case, if you cross to Blue-Gene Dempseys you face a small problem, there would be no way to differentiate between the regular JD and the Blue Gene Dempseys so you will not be able to sell them at a reasonable price, you might be forced to sell them at a JD price and it is kind of ridiculous as there is a good chance that they will turn out to be BG....
I think that from that perspective it is better to cross EBJDXBG, so you get more EBJD and you know that all the rest are BG...


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## mlancaster (Jul 24, 2009)

rmcder & sprungster,

Both good points, I agree that it is very important to attempt to get BGJDs and/or EBJDs that are as far away from each other lineage wise. I have also only read of the original documentation of the Hugo Luzardo, but I hope there were some other discoveries and/or wild caught BGJDs. Either way, I agree that a much stronger EBJD will be produced if the least amount of inbreeding is done to produce the parents, as with any aquarium bread fish (but the EBJD is more inbred as there is only so many original lineages, if not one, so it is more important to try and reduce the inbreeding).

As for the mixed fry of BGJDs and regular JDs (from the BGJD x BGJD), I agree it is not good to sell and give away fish labeled as anything they are not. However, (from what I have been told) there is no effective way to determine which fry are BGJD or JD, other than breeding them with BG or EBJDs. Therefore, I feel you will either have to cull the entire non EBJD portion of the spawn or sell as regular JDs with a chance of being a BGJD. As the BGJD & regular JD are relatively the same fish (besides recessive genetics) I do not personally see why it would be a problem to get them back in the market, even at a price lower than what you could get for a known BGJD. However even as I type this, I guess I realize the JD from a BGJD x BGJD spawn may have weaker lineage than a standard JD, as they come from a EBJD and therefore perhaps is it is best to not let this potentially weaker lineage of JD back in the market. So culling may be the best option. As sprungster stated, this situation may lead to the decision to breed EBJD x BGJD so you are certain of your Fry's JD type; especially if you are interested in selling the fry.

Again, I would like to reiterate this is not from personal experience breeding EBJDs; this is only from readings, discussions with breeders, and my own personal opinion. Therefore, any other ideas or thoughts are welcomed and hopefully I can continue to learn more.

Again Sprungster, you have a great looking EBJD.

Thanks,
Matt


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## salukicichlids (Apr 16, 2009)

Maybe at some point there should be a raising and breeding jack dempsey sticky since there is a lot of information on here about it


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## Colton (Aug 9, 2006)

thank you all for the information on these guys,

Colton


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## Toby_H (Apr 15, 2005)

I've raised a handful of Blue Dempseys to Adulthood, have bred a few dozen broods of BG Dempseys as well as a few dozen Broods containing Blue Dempseys... I have a few adult Blues now as well as a couple hundred baby Blues that have been born in my tanks.

I understand/agree that all Blue Dempseys in captivity are progeny of the single BG x BG F0 pair that Hector Luzardo found to produce Blue Dempseys. No one has claimed to have discovered any wild caught Blue or Blue Gene Dempseys except this single case.

So while it is true that all Blue Dempseys (and BGs) are from that single lineage, the amount of inbreeding taken place within the heritage of each specimen will impact the genetic quality of that specimen. Inbreeding in Cichlids is typically acceptable, but excessive inbreeding has proved to have negative affects. In scientific terms an "inbreeding coefficient" is often tracked to minimize the risk of excessive inbreeding. With Blue Dempseys we do not have the benefit of such documentation to our fish's heritage.

I have personally taken painstaking steps to separate "bloodlines" in attempts to offer my breeders as much genetic diversity as possible.

While I do believe that breeding unrelated BG x unrelated BG will yield better genetics than breeding unrelated BG x unrelated Blue. This is to minimize the amount of inbred Blue Dempsey genetics yet keeping the Blue coloration. But I have not raised resultant broods of each method to adulthood to make this comparison. Nor have I heard of anyone else doing so. So while I agree it is a good idea to promote such breeding methods, I do not believe we can conclusively say it yields better resultsâ€¦ and while it may be true in some cases it may prove false in others (depending on the heritage of the specimen in each case).

In my breeding experience, I have found that not all unrelated BGs paired with another unrelated BG make nice babies. At one point I had two separate broods (different Blue fathers and different standard mothers)... and kept the nicest males of one brood and the nicest females of the other brood. This was to prevent sibling x sibling inbreeding.

I made several pairs using "the best" fish from each brood. I found several of these pairs created very ugly babies (severe beak nose & other deformities) while others made pretty babies. I then took the pairs which created 'ugly babies' and switched partners and found many of them started to produce 'pretty babies'. I paid close attention and found at least once... the partners of two 'ugly baby' producing pairs were switched and both new pairs produced 'pretty babies'. This verifies that it wasnâ€™t a fish with â€˜bad genesâ€™ creating the ugly babies but was a â€˜bad mixâ€™ of two fish that could produce nice babies with a different fish.

I have no explanation for this one... I'm simply sharing experience...

Sprungster...

I am personally highly opposed to inbreeding Blue Dempseys any more than absolutely necessary. If you are in a position where no "other bloodline" is available, I feel it would be highly advantageous to your breeding program to breed your Blue male with two unrelated strong, healthy standard females... then make BG x BG pairs from these broods.

Using this approach would reduce your inbreeding coefficient... and would also allow you to create multiple BG x BG pairs each of which could be producing Blue Dempseys (as opposed to the single father-daughter pair your method will yieldâ€¦ with the option of sibling BG x sibling BG pairs).


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