Thanks, Norm. A forum is a funny place where you can make a comment and then wonder "Does everyone out there think that's the dumbest thing they've ever heard?"
Here's something really cool. In the Mendelian theory of genetics the exact opposite of inbreeding depression is call "Outbreeding Enhancement". This is also known as hybrid vigor or heterosis. So our buddy, the striped bass hybrid has so many good qualities in the F1 generation because the detrimental genes don't have a match on the same allele as the other species they are breeding with so all those little nasty traits disappear for one generation.
If upper case "A" is the better gene and lower case "a" is the detrimental gene then there is a high liklihood in an inbreeding population that the little "a"s end up finding each other.
Example: Aa X Aa = AA, Aa, Aa, aa
This means that one fish in four has both detrimental traits and becomes less viable. In a population with many varied individuals, it is far less likely to see the "aa" expression because each individual has the poor or mutated genes at different points on the DNA strand. Actually the Aa's aren't very good for a population because their progeny will often have an expressed detrimental gene pairing. Theoretically the "aa" can pop up many times on one DNA strand in one progeny, each one making the fish less viable, ultimately making it a genetic junk heap.
Heterosis or hybrid vigor means NO matching "aa" for one generation so the SBH gets good disease resistance, good growth and the good looks of both parents!
Bottom line is, don't start your pond with two crappie.
