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Hello,
I have seen this picture on Facebook:
picture
These are very likely to be the same fish that I have so much fry from. the overall habitus is exactly the same at least. Sadly I am still unable to take better pictures. There is a comment from Davy under the picture that they are some transitory form between bintan and phoenicurus and it seems like Peter Finke was the one to identify them? So my question goes probably to Peter mainly. Do we have some more info on this? Thanks very much in advance 🙂I also bought 10 of those same fish as David Strickland. From what I can gather they come from Jambi province in Sumatra, somit would seem reasonable to refer to them as P. ‘Jambi’
I will try to make some reasonable courtship coloration pictures as soon as I have good enough equipment. My males show this very often but I only have a bad camera and when I tried to change the water so its clear or when you add strong enough light to be able to make pictures they become all pale so its worth nothing. They are simply spoiled I think :unsure:
These are by far the best pictures I was able to make so far :but thats with very strong lighting right above the male and still its not enough light for the camera to capture it clear.
To “ourmanflint”:
Ourmanflint, indeed you should refer to your Paros as coming from Jambi/Sumatra. But even in 2005 we in Germany distinguished Jambi I and Jambi II already, and in the years since one man alone, Horst Linke, travelled three or four times in Jambi specialized in finding Parosphromenus habitats, and he found six or seven different forms. “P. spec. Jambi” is far too general and non-distinctive in order to be acceptable as a proper name for a hitherto undescribed form. You should use an exact as possible name of the importer to make these fish recognizable among the many forms from Jambi (since you do not know the exact location; Jambi is not very small, but the locations of the different forms which we know from there are relatively small). For instance, we called a distinctive form “spec. Mimbon 98”, later on one other “spec. Mimbon 2008”, since it had been imported via this whole-saler. If you have a look on the “Other forms”-chapter that you will find on this homepage in the main menue (left!) within the chapter “The fish” then you will see a long list of provisional but well-introduced names that have been used in order to make different undescribed Paros discernible. The list is not complete, but you will find Jambi I and Jambi II, for instance. It is highly unlikely that the now-called P. phoenicurus (former P. spec. Langgam) is identical we the fish you speak of since it was hitherto found and imported (and later on described) only once privately by Linke.
To “deepin’ peat”:
The fish shown in the photos is definitely not phoenicurus. No phoenicurus shows these bright blue-green bands in the unpaired fins. Nearly all those parts are brightly red in phoenicurus. I am sometimes not sure whether phoenicurus might be perhaps a synonym only for the formerly described P. tweediei. The locations of both forms are not far distinct, and the sealevel in between was far lower in former times; that means: the habitats were connected by a land-bridge and completely different rivers, swamps and creeks. The form of the tail, the extension of the red parts and the white lines in between which were taken to be species-distinctive by the describers Schindler and Linke (2012) disappeared rather completely in the many offspring that we raised from the imported specimens. Compare the original photo by Linke with the photos of direct offspring males by Fischer (for instance at the Wikipedia-page on “Prachtguramis”, which was written bei Martin Fischer.
The fish on your photos is very near to the from which was in the beginning of the Sumatra-boom traded as “spec. Blue Line” (a name given by the traders), very nice, very beautiful, brilliantly coulored fish. They were caught and exported (and cared for to death by “normal” aquarists looking for something nice and new for their “normal” flakes-fed and tap-water-filled community tanks) to Europe in many thousands for at least four or five years. Later on they mixed them with other forms from Sumatra obviously from other locations by far not as brilliantly looking as the original “blue line”-Paros. Your fish resemble (as far as I can see) these fish, but they are definitely not phoenicurus.
Hi Peter
a great response, and you are correct in pointing out that we should be vigilant in gaining collection localities for the proper segregation of types. Unfortunately even the importer in my case will not disclose exporter so I cannot contact directly. I am not happy about this situation really, but not much I can do until both importers and exporters take the differentiation of types more seriously, as to them it really doesn’t matter too much what they are called.
That is exactly the case. The problem begins with the catchers at the locations already. If they catch too little amounts of fish at a special place they will add others from a second location in the same bag if they look similar to the first ones. They have not the special perspective of the trained specialized aquarist and they are not used to the fact, that Parosphromenus fish are still differentiating by lively evolution even in near but distinct locations (as do Cryptocoryne forms in a similar way). Their employers, the exporters, either are equally well-informed or – more often, generally – are not interested in disclosing their productive locations. Their clients in Europe are unable to change this mentality and mostly factually unable to tell an exact location; so ist the shop-owner as last link in that chain.
We must try to inform the Asian partners that this would be necessary in order to pay attention to ongoing evolutionary processes, keep fish from different locations separate and not to mix them. From a biological point of view the clear naming of locations would be the best strategy, but the economic fears will prevent this. The best we can do is to name those fish with the safe names we have: their sellers and the year of import of that stock.
The rumours concerning phoenicurus do not stop. I just learn today (September 2nd) from Martin Hallmann that the German wholsaler Aquarium Dietzenbach has received a bunch of very good looking Paros form Indonesia which have been named “phoenicurus”. The manager of the company is no specialist and informed us at once.
We try to get more information. Without a picture of a male or at least a good description it is impossibe to say. But if the identification is correct, this would be a major import and interesting for many Paro friends.
We have new shipment of “deissneri” here but from importers description, I am already sure that they are some round tailed Paros, not deissneri. However the trader told me that he has some direct source that sends him fish from Calimantan, so if this is right, and they are not from Sumatra at least + given the tails they are most likely not filamentosus or linkei, it could be interesting right? I just wanted to drive there nad check instead of letting him send me some, becouse I am quite scared of getting bad sex ratios or fish in bad condition. They arrived on 16th last month and I still was not able to get there 🙁
[quote=”Deepin peat” post=3796]We have new shipment of “deissneri” here but from importers description, I am already sure that they are some round tailed Paros, not deissneri. However the trader told me that he has some direct source that sends him fish from Calimantan, so if this is right, and they are not from Sumatra at least + given the tails they are most likely not filamentosus or linkei, it could be interesting right? I just wanted to drive there and check instead of letting him send me some, becouse I am quite scared of getting bad sex ratios or fish in bad condition. They arrived on 16th last month and I still was not able to get there :([/quote]
So-called “deissneri” could be everything; we had imports that were factually Pseudosphromenus.
Mostly these fish are not interesting, bintan-variants. A stock of spec. Sentang at German company of Glaser’s consisted of 98% males!
Better concentrate on fish that you can buy directly from experienced breeders, if it is not a clear exception (which is possible, of course).
Again, the true deissneri lives endemically on Bangka only and was never imported by the trade. The trade is not active on Bangka. All our deissneris formerly were caught privately. But the stock is lost now. Only a private trip to Bangka could renew it.Only one day after my information about possible P. phoenicurus I can confirm that it is this species, indeed!
I have seen a photo showing definitely a young male of this attractive species from Sumatra, the first import containing several hundreds of definite P. phoenicurus. There have been rumours since long, but we could not confirm this because of missing or bad or definitely false photos. This time things are different: The identification is sure, a photo shows this species without doubt. We even have a location that sounds good, for it names “Langgam” as the place where the fish have been caught. I have seen the photo myself and Martin Hallmann has seen it and he cornfirmed the identification, too.
Now attention please: We should act immediately! All who read this and are interested in getting some animals should write to me personally at once (peter.finke at t-online.de). I shall gather the names and postal adresses and forward them to Martin Hallmann who will visit the wholesaler in southern Germany in a few days to discuss how things could go on. It is improbable that he could sent the fsih personally to each of us; he is a wholesaler. We must discuss that; at present I collect names and mail and postal adresses of people who would liek to have some animals out of this stock.
I cannot say how to deal with people not living in Germany; but they should tell me their interest too. By the way, the animals seem to be in good conditions.
Of course, now it is possible that the species appears in other countries, too. It might have before, but now the species is confirmed.We cannot exclude the possibility of a species-mix, but it is less probable than in other cases sind that location seems to be cornfirmed, too.
Please act and tell me your interest and number of pairs. I cannot tell that this will work, but we should try.
Good news Peter!
When the fish will be available? You can keep one or two pair for Bernd Bussler I think^^
I’m looking for one male phoenicurus only but I’m french, ship is expensive with DHL express Worldwide but It takes only 1 day between Germany and France.
Maybe available to the next IGL meeting in october?
I am heavy in temptation – I just discuss in another thread the live food vacation question 😉 …
I would have still room for one another 54l tank … but vacation/absence service 😉 is very worried …to this I would just say that if its not very often, not feeding the fish for one week at all is not a problem as long as they are adult and in good condition. This is true for most of the species. So if you do not have anyone to care about the fish well and you would have to make someone who could overfeed or do something else badly, then just not feeding for such periods is better. If you have fry, it is different and taking the risk is inevitable. With small fry, not feeding for days is quite a problem.
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