Bruce , ML & Theo :

Thank each of you for the info ,ideas and response. I agree with you. From what I thought and as you have confirmed genitics does work that way. I belived that at the time , even in view of the biologist's answer and I still think so today. I think , as Bruce noted ,that either he misunderstood the question or knew somthing that I didn't relative to the population or condition of the pond. Bruce I think you are exactly right, he thought that in a healthy but under feed pond genetics were not the problem and did not need addressing. It was his way of saying ,and I agree , deal with water quality and forage base first and foremost. I did and added new genes anyway. ML for me those cows { fish} had been in the same pasture together for to long.

To me genetics is to a large part dealing with probability and statistical analysis. You may get lucky one time but in the end the rules of nature will control. I don't want to take that bet in my ponds.

That leaves me with the questions of how many parents, how big of a population and for how long. If you have any thoughts ,data or suggested readings on these I would be interested. I know that The American Fisheries Society has a book on population genetics that would probably be a good place to start.

Thanks for your efforts on this thread. ewest