Favorite Rainbowfish?

[BIG BAD BARRY]

I Boesmani and Lake Katubu (M.Lacustris).
I only have the one Lake Katubu male at the moment and i am tending to agree with Jamepss at the moment.
It displayed its yellow/gold banding on top of its body properly the other day and it was amazing to see. Its blue goes purply sometimes s well

sanj - your fish are amazing!

 

[mikka23]

I picked up some rainbowfish today, will post some pictures tomorrow hopefully. They are very young but already look pretty good. Pretty sure the G.wanamensis is a hybrd but its so young I guess its hard to tell.

 

[J_mann]

That's a nice pic but Wanamensis are quite rare in this country and I have seen hybrids labelled as Wanamensis when they're clearly not. They are available though as the ones in my LFS I'm 90% sure are the real deal. I've never seen Parva anywhere though.

 

[J_mann]

That's a nice pic but Wanamensis are quite rare in this country and I have seen hybrids labelled as Wanamensis when they're clearly not. They are available though as the ones in my LFS I'm 90% sure are the real deal. I've never seen Parva anywhere though.

Hello All, New to this forum amd like a few others, I'm trying to get into rainbowfish as well. The tough thing is getting good fish, As mentioned, lots of hybrids out there brought about by mass production and people not being careful with their fish. I didn't think it was going to be this tough. I've got a few bows from LFS's. Four of them are hybrids (M.splendins variety I think), but still fairly good looking and two M.lacustris with really good coloring, but the male's snout is a little too pinched I think. I'm glad to find this site with people who have bought these fish locally as have I. Unfortunatly once the RF bug has bitten and you see the difference in some privately bred fish, well you want "those fish". I agree with a lot that has been said on this thread..there are still some good fish available from commercial sources but you have to stick to the more common species. The plate of G.wanamensis is beautiful but I doubt anyone but a very few private breeders have them in USA. I believe what is available is a hybrid and the anal fin on these will be short, not long and flowing like the plate. If you want to go crazy try this site out http/rainbow-fish.org/forums/index. These are some really serious breeders/hobbyist with some of the members published collectors who brought RF over to Europe. I joined that forum and if you look through some of the threads, you can really learn a lot, but I wouldn't post until you get a "feel" for what's going on there. Anyway good to find you guys and gals too I guess.
J_mann

 

[Sanj]

Hi guys,

I have had to travel into Europe; Belgium, Netherlands, Germany in order to obtain line bred specimens, but not eggs not many if any will send eggs. I am currently in the process of moving house, but I do breed these fish on a small scale rotational basis. So Later I will have a few to sell on.

MA Crowland (nr Peterborough) did actually have M.douboulayi "Kangaroo Creek" some months ago, but at £60/pair. I believe these fish were actually the real deal, looking at their colour, body form. Have to say this particular store appears to have had some good looking rainbows even if they could not always give the level of history you might want to verify the lines. MA does have an Indonesian supplier, but again details arent often forthcoming. They also get fish occasionally from hobbyists. I would say the standard has improved alot in the last few years.

Still if you are mad like me, I prefer to go to Europe. lol

There are some good breeders in the USA, but they arent much use for the UK. Also there are a lot of bad breeders in the USA and alot of the rainbows from Florida fish farms are not pure, apparently. As mentioned with G.Wanamensis it is often a hybrid. Aquabid has a few rogues.

if you see great rainbows in the shop, get them on those merits if you like them, they dont have to be pure lines, but if you breed them and pass them on that is where the issues can arise.

 

[ChilliPepper]

I have M. praecox and M. lacustris. I have to say I prefer the latter as they are hardier and even better than I imagined. I do love the praecox as well, but find they get to a certain size then start showing signs of illness, and whatever I do, they don't recover. Not sure why, but suspect poor breeding. I won't be getting anymore of these unless I find a really, really good breeder.

 

[Carlovel1]

Madagascar Rainbow are my favourites

 

[Sanj]

I have M. praecox and M. lacustris. I have to say I prefer the latter as they are hardier and even better than I imagined. I do love the praecox as well, but find they get to a certain size then start showing signs of illness, and whatever I do, they don't recover. Not sure why, but suspect poor breeding. I won't be getting anymore of these unless I find a really, really good breeder.

This is quite common with shop bought praecox. Some people have found that those bred in the Czech Republic are relatively hardier relative to the captive bred specimens in Asia. In the past I have kept LFS praecox, but have not had great success with eaither stock population. The last I had was a group of 25, after 18 months there was only one surviving. Have to say he was a healthy strong coloured male, but I would not say 1/25 survival is symptom of healthy stock.

I currently keep F2 generation strain of "Pagai Village" praecox and they are hardy good coloured fellows. I will breed from these eventually.

 

[Squidward]

I saw a photo on the net of something called a parkinsonii I think it was called. Not sure of the exact name and spelling.
A very bright red and blue fish - amazing.

Went to my lfs to see if they had any. They were drab brown youngsters. But the photo of the adult on the label looked very different to the other photo I had seen. So I decided to leave them.

 

[Jamepsss]

I saw a photo on the net of something called a parkinsonii I think it was called. Not sure of the exact name and spelling.
A very bright red and blue fish - amazing.

Went to my lfs to see if they had any. They were drab brown youngsters. But the photo of the adult on the label looked very different to the other photo I had seen. So I decided to leave them.

Parkinsons are beautiful. Very striking orange 'flames' on the fins, usually with a bit of orange spreading into the body of the fish. They can look almost luminous under the right conditions.

 

[Squidward]

I saw a photo on the net of something called a parkinsonii I think it was called. Not sure of the exact name and spelling.
A very bright red and blue fish - amazing.

Went to my lfs to see if they had any. They were drab brown youngsters. But the photo of the adult on the label looked very different to the other photo I had seen. So I decided to leave them.

Parkinsons are beautiful. Very striking orange 'flames' on the fins, usually with a bit of orange spreading into the body of the fish. They can look almost luminous under the right conditions.

This sounds very different to the photo I saw on the net and the photo I saw at the lfs.
The ones that I am interested in are very read in the front half and bright blue rears. Does this sound familiar?

 

[Sanj]

This sounds very different to the photo I saw on the net and the photo I saw at the lfs.
The ones that I am interested in are very read in the front half and bright blue rears. Does this sound familiar?

I would be careful of just relying on one or two photos from the net because photos can be manipulated and not always represent true colours. Look at different sources to get a more rounded view. M.parkinsoni tends to be either orange coloured or yellow on the back half. There is also another strain where most ofthe body is coloured and this is called "Orient". This later strain is not commonly available (if at all) in the uk.

 

[Squidward]

This sounds very different to the photo I saw on the net and the photo I saw at the lfs.
The ones that I am interested in are very read in the front half and bright blue rears. Does this sound familiar?

I would be careful of just relying on one or two photos from the net because photos can be manipulated and not always represent true colours. Look at different sources to get a more rounded view. M.parkinsoni tends to be either orange coloured or yellow on the back half. There is also another strain where most ofthe body is coloured and this is called "Orient". This later strain is not commonly available (if at all) in the uk.

The first photo that I saw was of someone's fish on another forum.
Perhaps it is one of the mislabeled hybrids?

 

[drobbyb]

I've waited to post in this thread because frankly I can't make up my mind. If we are to say our favorite rainbow species that we have kept, my favorite are M. lacustris.

If we are talking about of all the species, I would have to pick M. kamaka.

 

[mikka23]

May as well post in this thread. Here is a short couple videos of my young rainbows. ID on the young ones wanted. The wanamensis is visible at the end of the first, the anal fin does look longer than normal but maybe not long enough? The supposed autralis is in the second one. The parva is so small its impossible to really see anything.

http/www.youtube.com/watch?v=0M5SCDvPpzQ
http/www.youtube.com/watch?v=iUq7ZXNMxh8




PS. I have never heard of kamaka, I also couldn't really find many photos on google. Any other pictures?