What we tend to forget is that most of the angels in the hobby are not wild, they are the result of breeding by us in ways that may alter things over time. I have only ever wanted two varieties of angels. The first were double dark blacks and I was given 6 by a breeder with an unusually lovely black. The looked like they were made of black velevet. They came to me small and as they grew a pair finally formed and I had to move out the other 3 (one was lost in growing). Cichlids are not always nice fish, especially when they become pairs and then parents. They are merciless then.
I had the angels in my planted 45 gal. community tank. Then one day I noticed all the other fish cowering at either end of the tank. It was not long after that the angels began to clean a large anubias leaf. And then came the eggs, over 500 in the first spawn. And this was when I realized I did not want to be an angel breeder. But there was a good side to this story. The lady who bred them lost her line . But I had managed to raise about 25 of the 500 fry I got. I was not equiped to do much more than this. So I was able to send her back about a dozen of the kids so she could get the line back.
The only other angels I ever wanted were Altums which mostly they came out of the wild as they are very difficult to spawn in captivity. It took me years before I felt I was even able to try keeping them. My first group all died oon after they arrived. I and other memebesr of the wild anegl site (now gone) worked with an importer in Texas to bring in about 100. Only 2 of the 100 surived after the first month. Wild Altums cannot fight off most of the things we have in our tanks because wild angels have no resistance to them. Wild Altums live in water with a pH around 4.0. Many bacteria cannot live in such acid water.
One of the members on the angel site managed to spawn them with the help of one of the Admins who was an expert. The four larger Altums I have now were tank bred by him. I took them in trade as partial payment from a buyer of my plecos. Tank raised Altums are way more hardy than than those taken from the wild.
In the wild, altums live in groups and manage to get along fine. My four have been living together in my tank for many years, There is minimal squabling and I mostly see them hanging together. I was told by the person from whom I got my first try at Altums and who also breed wild discus explained the following to me. In the wild, discus live in large groups. Some of the group- the largest and baddest live at the perimeter of the group and act as it's defenders. These tend also to be the most colorful and are very desirable. However, when they get imported their fins are usually in poor shape from fighting. One has to be prepared to patiently wait for their fins to regrow to see their real beauty.
But what was more interesting was when I was told that wild scalare angels will often shelter within the a discus group to take advantage of the protection this offers. I cannot confirm any of this, but having been in this guy's fishroom and seen his fish and the most elaborate system for supplying very acid water to his tanks I have ever seen, I have no reason to think he was not accurate in what he told me.
This is just one example of how taking fish from the wild and then creating many color and fin morphs via selective breeding in captivity can change the natural temperament of a species. If you want to see some of the prettiest angels you have ever seen, watch the vid below:
