Day's Paradise Fish

[Jayhawk]

After going out of town for a week and a half, I came home to an injured/dying paradisefish. Not sure what happened, but there was a huge open wound on one side and he died the day after I returned home.

For some reason, standard paradisefish are hard to find in my area, but a LFS had some spike tailed paradisefish...when I got there I realized there were Pseudosphromenus dayi which are often called Day's paradisefish or spike tailed paradise fish. Here is a pic I found on the web:

Just wanted to share my cool find.

Anyone ever kept these guys before? I've wanted them since I first saw them in Pinter's Labyrinth Fish book (that must have been in the early 90s).

I now have a male and a female in a bag adjusting to my water temp and parameters.

Eric

 

[TheBigSpoon]

Sorry to hear about your paradise fish.

Spike tails are pretty cool from what I've seen, I've never kept one but my LFS has a few and I was thinking about pickin one up, do you know how big they get? And I'd love to see some pics of yours if you get a chance to post some!

 

[Jayhawk]

I'll try to get some pic's up...maybe next week. Mine are about 2" total length, and I think the max is about 2.75"...but I'm not sure if that's SL or TL.

 

[Jayhawk]

OK, sorry it took so long...they were rather shy at first and took a while to get eating dry food (they've always loved blood worms, though). Also, I had an ich outbreak (my own fault - didn't quarantine since we're showing our house and didn't want to put up the QT tank).

Here are a few pictures (sorry for the poor shots):

This is the dominant male...I thought I had a male/female pair...might still - the smaller fish's tail is more spade shaped and this fish's tail is bifurcated.

I'm glad they're not so shy anymore...I'm not a fan of fish who hide all day.

Eric

 

[TheBigSpoon]

He looks great!

 

[Chrisinator]

Awesome!

 

[Jayhawk]

Thanks guys. The two are spending more time together...still hoping they're a pair. The big one (pictured above) was in a cave about a week ago (they bubble nest in caves which is pretty cool) and his lower half was bright red. Not sure if he was in the mood hoping a female would come along or if maybe the other is a female and he was trying to lure her to his den of love...

 

[Death Pony]

I hope you have a pair. They look awesome!

 

[Jayhawk]

Update - well, the larger spike tail stopped eating about 4 weeks ago (no visable signs of any illness at all) and died a week ago. He kept building bubble nests right up to the day he died and guarding them...but not eating. I'm not sure what was going on. He appeared to be fully mature when I got him, and I know they're usually wild caught...so he could just have been old. Still, it was odd. It was one of those situations where I didn't want to treat him because I had no idea what his problem was. I try not to treat unless necessary.

Anyone else ever have an anabantid stop eating while building bubble nests repeatedly and then die?

In contrast, the slightly smaller spike tail is doing great.

Eric