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- May 29, 2008
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Can I introduce new bloodlines into my dubia colony without any problems?
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Blaptica dubia question
- Thread starter PsychoSpider
- Start date
There is no need to, unless your colony is around 40 years old....
Almost all tropical roaches in the USA are related to the same original imports, so unless you get some fresh wild caught ones....
Then there is the issue of roaches going for hundreds of generations without any new "blood".
Almost all tropical roaches in the USA are related to the same original imports, so unless you get some fresh wild caught ones....
Then there is the issue of roaches going for hundreds of generations without any new "blood".
- Joined
- May 29, 2008
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ok thanks. time to go buy more roaches
Seems like I read somewhere that wild dubia are somewhat larger and the males are better flyers than our domestic stock. The species gets smaller over many generations in captivity because the smaller males mature faster and get first dibs on breeding apparently.
But yeah, all the dubia you find are inbred like crazy. However for simple organisms like roaches the chances of genetic problems induced by inbreeding are less than they are for more complicated organisms like humans.
But yeah, all the dubia you find are inbred like crazy. However for simple organisms like roaches the chances of genetic problems induced by inbreeding are less than they are for more complicated organisms like humans.
siliconthoughts
Arachnopeon
- Joined
- Feb 27, 2004
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There are a couple ways to lose genetic variation, and inbreeding is probably not the major factor with a roach colony.
Inbreeding is largely a function of population size, and as long as you are keeping a couple hundred breeders there is plenty of opportunity for retaining a lot of different genes in the population. Unless you have a really small colony, inbreeding is not going to be a major factor.
A more significant factor is selection, which occurs for example when individuals have a differential reproductive advantage - maturing faster by doing it at a smaller size could lead to smaller roaches, but it isn't due to inbreeding.
Genetic drift is another issue, which isn't really inbreeding but is similiar in some effects -it is just random loss of variation that causes populations to become different. It only takes a small amount of genetic transfer to prevent this, and that is the major benefit from trading for other stock - to keep your dubia like everybody else's.
Colin
Inbreeding is largely a function of population size, and as long as you are keeping a couple hundred breeders there is plenty of opportunity for retaining a lot of different genes in the population. Unless you have a really small colony, inbreeding is not going to be a major factor.
A more significant factor is selection, which occurs for example when individuals have a differential reproductive advantage - maturing faster by doing it at a smaller size could lead to smaller roaches, but it isn't due to inbreeding.
Genetic drift is another issue, which isn't really inbreeding but is similiar in some effects -it is just random loss of variation that causes populations to become different. It only takes a small amount of genetic transfer to prevent this, and that is the major benefit from trading for other stock - to keep your dubia like everybody else's.
Colin
I frequantly cull surplas males out of my colonies. I always target the small ones, and when my colony was small it was effective, and easy to do. However, my colony is way to large to hand pick males out of the bins...I would be there for days.
That said, this wouldn't be a bad practice for someone with an average sized colony used for feeding animals and not retail sales.
That said, this wouldn't be a bad practice for someone with an average sized colony used for feeding animals and not retail sales.