Borellii vs opal

[Muskies85]

Hi everyone. Looking into getting Borellii opal as I just love that blue color. I see on the TomC website it has A101-A104 as various types of Borellii and A105 as opal. My question is which other number is sold as Borellii if opal is 105. Also are there any differences between the two species other than the coloration? Thank you guys!

 

[Muskies85]

Anybody?

 

[rasmusW]

as far as i know, "opal" is an aquarium strain. -and i guess the rest is color variation and catch location, which may or may not end up in different sub species.. -but i could be very wrong.

-r

 

[Mike Wise]

A. borellii (Opal) was originally a spectacular domestic color strain of A. borellii developed by East German aquarists back in the 1960s. This strain disappeared sometime in the 1980s. Now A. borellii (Opal) is used for any A. borellii - wildcaught or domestic bred - that has a lot of red on the face: same species (for now) just different color morphs.

 

[Rapophie]

I read in a couple of German-speaking sources, that borellii Opal is a local colour variation from the Rio Paraguay, but as already stated, most people will likely refer to any borellii with a red face, since hybrids, bred (I actually have not seen evidence of those yet) and natural strains are hard to tell apart. Though sometimes you can come across people who try to keep their population free from the non-natural ones.