View Full Version : UPDATE on my new fishy
peifc
07-26-2003, 12:00 AM
Well, darn! Hmm...my Blue Dempsey were being picked on by my Firemouth. At first, it was standard JD now Firemouth. I removed the JD and put her in another tank with male Con and one of the mix BPs (a BP that has red devil/midas's head). And the JD got picked on big time. OK...she was stress and freaking out. NO good.
I noticed my Blue Dempseys got the personalities of the deform Blood Parrots...so calm. They only bully the weak. I just moved that 2 Dempseys into my Blood Parrots and Severums tank.
The only fish I have to worry about now is my Flag Cichlid. Soon I will need to move that fish into a smaller tank I have. If I don't, that Carpinte will kill that little guy one day. I guess that small tank can only keep small Cichlids like Flag Cichlid.
*sigh* Never know fishy can give a human headache :D
So far, my Blue Dempseys are happier in the Community tank. Yippy for me and the fishy :p
Anyone ever experience this? Headache over which fish goes where to reach harmony?
Cypherman
07-26-2003, 12:54 AM
Its even harder when you only have one tank :rolleyes:
andruboz
07-26-2003, 1:16 AM
my headache often comes after i figure out where the fish is going to go.
as soon as i dip the net in the water, the fishes i.q. jumps 50 points, [or maybe my i.q. falls 50] and the only way i can net a fish that doesnt want to be netted is to remove ornaments.
darn firemouth the other day was so good at avoiding the net he swam into my hand in the corner of the tank. if he hadn't, i might still be there splashing and cussing.
want to move my vieja bifasciatum but its been a week and i still havent been able to catch him.
ChilDawg
07-26-2003, 7:54 AM
Cichlids are smart fish, so I would go with andruboz as to when the headache comes...but proper stocking of fish and juggling tanks does lead to the headaches, too.
(The only cure...get more tanks...everybody could use more tanks, right? :D)
peifc
07-26-2003, 10:34 AM
Originally posted by ChilDawg
Cichlids are smart fish, so I would go with andruboz as to when the headache comes...but proper stocking of fish and juggling tanks does lead to the headaches, too.
(The only cure...get more tanks...everybody could use more tanks, right? :D)
I would love to get more tanks, but where to put the tanks will be the biggest question I have.
As for netting the fish, I learned that I can't "chase" the fish with the net. I have to follow the fish with the net until the fish either goes near the glass or corner....net it :D
My Firemout was very difficult to catch. That was the method I used.
Cypherman
07-26-2003, 11:28 AM
I have no patience for that. I chase em down. Hopefully they tire out before I do :D
peifc
07-26-2003, 12:09 PM
Originally posted by Cypherman
I have no patience for that. I chase em down. Hopefully they tire out before I do :D
Haha...I bet you will get tired before the fish.
With my JD...I sorta scared her to hide inside the cave. Then I picked the cave up with her inside.
I noticed with Dempseys, they usually stayed on one spot especially they are scared, repeatedly too. Firemouth is just a constant swimmer. Convicts are between that, swim and hide.
peifc
07-26-2003, 12:16 PM
After I moved the Blue Dempseys, their colors are more intense right now. When they were in the 92g tank with ph being a bit higher than 7.0, their colors were quite pale. In this 72g tank, they are so blue with ph of 6.5
I think my male Blue Dempsey almost got his eye pick. I saw a little scar near his eye. Glad to rescue him before my little Firemouth chased him to death. *whew* Poor little guy. And my female Blue Dempsey is more aggressive than the male. She is chasing him around the tank sometimes. Thank goodness my Blood Parrot put a stop to that all the time. At least in this 72g tank, my Blue Dempseys actually can swim freely without feeling fear :p
Cypherman
07-26-2003, 10:27 PM
My female is also the more aggressive, despite being the smallest. She is even smaller than my normal dempseys yet will flare and rush them if they cross her. They're still so irritatingly skittish tho :mad: She's th eonly one who hasnt become completely cobalt blue like the males. Her body is still bright silver with a blue head, back, and tail...
peifc
07-26-2003, 11:02 PM
Well...hell!
My female Blue Dempsey does the same. She even went up against a female Con last time...that con was 1" bigger than her.
My female BD just picked on my male. Now I wonder if it was actually my female BD injured my male BD. And it seems like the wound is nearer to the eye that I would like to believe. I worry my little guy will get popeye. *#*^%#)@
However, I've made the decision. I'm going to get another Blue Dempsey...a larger one.
I will post another picture...hopefully Monday or Tuesday...to show how blue my BD gets now. Brilliant color.
Cypherman
07-26-2003, 11:49 PM
They're fun, aren't they? I just set up their new filter and tossed in a beefheart cube to get them out from behind the driftwood. They go nuts over it and really pig out heh. Fun to watch. I'd buy more but I want to breed them, and I need normals to breed with the blues...
peifc
07-27-2003, 12:11 AM
I wish to breed them too, but the problem is that my female standard JD is too agressive to go with my BD. That's why I have decided to get a bigger one...so that my female JD will not think of being aggressive with the big BD.
I'm planning to feed them beefheart soon. Hopefully they like home made fish food :D
ChilDawg
07-27-2003, 12:35 AM
BDs are really delicate fish, so they may not withstand the attentions of standard JDs, no matter how much size they have on the standards. Also, if I'm not mistaken, the BD comes from a series of recessive genes that would be dominated by those of standard JDs. This would mean that it would be nearly impossible to get back to the BD form within a generation of the crossing.
I think that they're beautiful fish, but they have some serious genetic defects. I'd search this site for info on them to see how to care for them, and see if any of us here have had success with the breeding...and the cross-breeding to which you aspire.
I'm not trying to be negative, but realistic...and I'm just going with what I have learned. If anyone has experience or information to the contrary, I will gladly admit that I am wrong in going on this diatribe.
Cypherman
07-27-2003, 1:04 AM
You are correct Childawg. You have to cross the offspring with the full blues to get true blue fry since it is a recessive trait, so it would take some time to pull off. I am mostly interested in testing whether the "Bb" (heterozygous) offspring are more colorful than the usual jacks, as I've heard jacks carrying the recessive gene but not displaying it do have more blue...The gene must be codominant if that is the case (I think i used the right terminology...man, Cell Bio seemed so long ago...)
Of course someone has succeeded in breeding these beautiful fish. I got mine from Jeff Rapps. And mine was locally bred.
And yes, I know that they have recessive genes. If we don't try, how would we know we fail or succeed?
ChilDawg
07-27-2003, 10:34 AM
Since they aren't naturally-occuring, someone must have bred them, you're right. I just wanted to warn you of the trials and tribulations that you might see with such a breeding project, but if you are ambitious enough to undertake it and are undeterred by my "sky is falling and it's bringing Blue Dempseys with it" diatribe, then I'd say to go for it. Let us know how the project goes, and plenty of pix would be much-appreciated! :)
here's an article about the BD
http://www.elacuarista.com/secciones/tfhblue.htm
ScottoMacD
07-27-2003, 9:24 PM
Originally posted by jimbo
here's an article about the BD
http://www.elacuarista.com/secciones/tfhblue.htm
Without getting into some rant about the Blue Dempsey. ( I have 6 right now, directly from the original breeder in Brazil) Most of you have heard it from me before. Including the breeding of the fish. I have to respectfully and completely DISAGREE with that article. It IMO has taken a bunch of facts and some half truths and form this particular fellows "theory" on the Blue JD.
As for breeding. Realistically you are looking at a minimum 2 year project to get viable off spring if you are going to seriously attempt to try and breed these fish.
Yes you will have to cross breed and
Yes you will need to spend a whole lot more money to make this work. JD are very picky when it comes to choosing a mate you will need quite a few more blues and then hope that they mate up with a regular. That is not even a given if your particular Blues have not been purposely sterilized when they were fry. Which is apparently a very common occurance. (keeps the demand and prices up)
You are looking at roughly 3 generations of off spring, crossing the batches before you will be able to breed the fish true.
peifc
07-27-2003, 10:59 PM
*sigh* It might work. It might not work. Just have to trial and error. That's why this is our hobby, right? To own these cichlid and hopefully to breed some unique ones.
peifc
07-28-2003, 11:49 AM
Here are more pictures of my new fishy.
Male Blue Dempsey
http://www.peifc.com/Our_fish/112-1263_IMG.JPG
Male Blue Dempsey again
http://www.peifc.com/Our_fish/112-1295_IMG.JPG
Female Blue Dempsey
http://www.peifc.com/Our_fish/113-1305_IMG.JPG
Carpinte
http://www.peifc.com/Our_fish/112-1262_IMG.JPG
Flag Cichlid
http://www.peifc.com/Our_fish/112-1294_IMG.JPG
Another picture of my Flag Cichlid
http://www.peifc.com/Our_fish/112-1251_IMG.JPG
ScottoMacD
07-28-2003, 2:26 PM
peifc:
Just a question?
How did you go about sexing the JD's? The still look far to young to sex?
In most cases you won't be able to sex them until they are about 3.5 to 4 Inches. Finnage on juvenile JD's is very deceptive. Especially with the blues.
Thanks. :)
I look at their Dorsal Fins. I've asked Jeff Rapps for male and female. That's what he selected for me :) The differences between my BDs are very severe. Well, pictures are hard to tell, but in person...very different.
I could be wrong, but I doubt that heavily.
And I also read that's how they can tell gender wise...even when they are as young as 2".
I'm planning to get maybe 2 more BDs...a bit bigger. Let's see what Jeff will select for me.
ScottoMacD
07-28-2003, 2:57 PM
Thanks for the info.
Jeff posts quite a bit at aquamojo.com. You should check it out. They have some really great cichlid people there.
Best of luck with the blues!
Have you ever though of just a species tank with them?
I have mine mixed right now but the more I think about it a Blue JD species tank would probably work very well.
Not now though, but I would love to do so in the near future.
Any thought of breeding all these beautiful fish, I have to wait until I have moved to a bigger apartment. All these fish tanks are taking up space fast :D Hopefully, within couple years that I can start this obsessive hobby...breeding them (don't mean just BD) and showing them off.
Also, my BDs don't get along with my standard JD. She is too aggressive to be near the BDs. My JD had chased and nipped on my BDs several times. Like you said, breeding them and pairing them off will be hard. Apparently, my JD just doesn't like any new members in the tank. For that result alone, I have moved my BDs to a community tank.
Indeed, in the future, I would love to observe JD and BD behavior within their own tank...how different are they from each other.
dave76
07-28-2003, 5:03 PM
perhaps the secret in breeding them is not finding a Blue Dempsey that your standard JD will like. Perhaps it is in finding a Standard JD that is more mellow and not as agressive? Just my .02.
That is still coming down to the same thing...that if they like each other. Even if my JD likes the BD...doesn't mean my BD wants the JD.