females - orange - red - what?

[farm41]

I originally wanted red cacautoides and all the lfs had was orange cacs., so I bought the orange ones. Now they have some nice looking triple reds that a customer brought in. I don't see any difference in the females. Is it just the males that show the colors? Can any female cac. be used? How does it work?

I do have another tank that I could turn into an red cac. tank, I really want those reds.

 

[Z Man]

About 2 years ago I thought that a pair of Orange Flash Cacatuoides were the best looking Apisto's I had ever seen. Purchased them and did breed them, many times. BUT, the children when grown up turned out to be: Orange Flash, Double Red, Triple Red and some very dull ones. What I have learned is that especially in the Cacatuoides and in some instances the Agassizi they have been bred so often that they really don't breed true. If I were you, I would breed this pair and see what you end up with. I could state many instances where wild fish can only be found in one color type but in the hobby all varities are available. The one we most recognize is the Angelfish which is only found in the wild as silver with black stripes. Look what color morphs they have evolved into.

 

[farm41]

So, I could get reds out of these fish, huh. Well I guess I'll just keep what I've got. I like the apisto's so much that in a addition to my 38g I am going to turn the 60g tetra tank into an Apisto tank.

These are my first cichlids and I really like them.

Can I keep my 6 cory's and still have apisto's in the 60g, or is that just too much activity for the apisto's?

What would be a comfortable population of apisto's in a heavily planted 60g? Should I keep some tetras in the tank with them?

 

[Neil]

farm41,
Zman is correct. There are numerous aquarium strain species out there that have touches of several species-forms in them.
The first several times that I worked with Orange Flash with solid orange fins, they threw all red offspring with black reticulations in the fins - every spawn! I finally got some nice Triple Red cacatuoides and Orange Flash cacatuoides from Germany. The Orange Flash spawned true, throwing all Orange Flash babies time after time. The interesting thing was that the Triple Red pair threw about 10% Orange Flash babies that I used for breeders and got 100% Orange Flash fry!!! Go figure that out. Maybe someone with a genetic background, like Charlotte can explain this.
An important issue here is that the good specimens of these two populations are very distinguishable. I cannot even think about selling a combination of these fish, because they are different and I would not be sure that they would not produce a combination of the two forms. The females from the Orange form has orange fins but lighter than the male, and the females from the red form has red and black fins. Good cacatuoides females of these forms will have the same color fins as the male, just to a lesser degree. The females that I look for in breeding are as nice as most cacatuoides males that I see out there (see pics in the Gallery). This, IMO, produces the strongest perpetuation of specific color in the form.
However, as Zman said, it is entirely likely that you will get a combination of the forms in spawns with your females. From there, if you are inclined, you can play with selective breeding to "tighten" up the form ratio and quality. Neil