Marbled Hatchetfish
- Thread starter Ulan
- Start date
Well, how sure can I be? They had a school of roughly a dozen fish labeled as "Marbled Hatchetfish". Most were still pretty small, and those had a near solid black pattern. Some were a bit larger, and the larger they were, the less color the pattern had. The largest fish had still the same visible pattern as the small ones, but it was colorless and only visible because it broke the light differently.
Lupin
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- Sep 21, 2006
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- Paul
Ulan, do you have pics of both hatchets? There are over 5 species currently that exist around the trade from time to time.
my marble hatchets are a little over an inch and still have strong color.most pet stores keep different hatchets together since they can be differentiated so easily. try searching pictures of common, silver, and other hatchetfish to see if it was indeed a different fish or sick marbles.
Unfortunately not. I didn't take my camera into the pet store, and I'm not sure what they think if I start taking pics there.
Is there more than one hatchedfish species with marbled patterns as little ones? The larger ones still had a faint hint of the pattern, but it was hardly visible. And the effect was gradual: The larger the fish, the fainter the pattern.
I read up on this kind of fish, and they should also have a colored stripe near the back. I don't remember if the ones in the shop had one. This shop is usually really good with fish, but I remember that I had also difficulties seeing any pattern at all when they had marbles last time. The tank was bare, but the lighting subdued, so they should not be afraid. They schooled relatively tightly, though.
I would have bought them - they were not very expensive - but I can't have any fish at the moment. And I'm not sure whether it's a good thing to cramp flying fish like that into a 20 long.
keep in mind that some fish do not show their full colors when they are at the LFS. it can take a few days for the fish to become fully settled in. the larger ones could have been part of a recent shippment and were not fully adjusted to the LFS's conditions.
I went to one of my LFS a couple days ago to check out/buy some Het. Rasboras. They had maybe 20 in one of their tanks, with only 4-5 of them having any visible red coloration to them. One of the employees walked up and asked what and how many I was looking for... asked what size tank I had... seemed to actually want to make sure they would be going to a decent situation. Then said, we've only got the 4-5 red harlequins left... we had a ton the other day, but not all that we hae are these silver ones :drool:
Apparently she had no idea the fish would look pale or not show their color when stressed or in poor conditions. She was amazed that the wierd silver rasboras were the regular red ones they had a few days ago. I understand it's not really her fault, but I wish more of these employees abtually knew about fish.
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