There is a lot on the Forum about Fla , Northern , F-1 and F-X LMB. I tried some of Todd's and they did well. I do take issue with 2 points.

"... F1's seem to be slightly more aggressive than the pure Florida's but the main selling point is their willingness to feed train and stay on pellets in a natural environment,... "

The main selling point for F-1 and the reason they were first developed by the founding hatchery was the increased aggressiveness (vs Flas) as many of their customers were complaining about not being able to catch the stocked pure Flas.

" The downside to F1's is that as they interbreed in the long run you end up with F2,F3,F4,FX..etc These latter generations lack the hybrid vigor of the first cross and ultimately without the supplementation of genetics in the long run you will end up with fish that has no extraordinary genetic characteristics and is similar to what you would find naturally.

I don't believe this to be accurate - IMO. This has been covered before on the Forum. Lack of hybrid vigor comes from outbreeding depression and occurs in the FX offspring of crosses of 2 different species (not within a species) ie hybrid Bluegill ( a GSF X BG cross). Some studies show that the 2 LMB types are too close genetically to result in this happening. Some disagree with this analysis and believe it does occur. I have not personally seen outbreeding depression in F-1 in my 20 years of following their use. You can plan around this by stocking some pure northerns and some pure Flas (which I have also done). There is a lot (very lot) we don't know about mixing Fla , F-1 and Northerns together and what happens over time. Some data suggest Fla genes tend to dominate (in southern use) other data is inconclusive when the % of Fla fish is low vs F-1 and Northerns. It is just a big " it depends" situation. I know of ponds stocked with just F-1s for over 15 years with no such issues.

Last edited by ewest; 01/12/21 06:58 PM.