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Albino Cyrtocara Moorii (white Dolphins)


firthy13

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Do you still breed the albino Dimi, Buccal?

These fish were my bane when I was breeding. At the time I think I bought everything I could find in Australia. Buying single fish and having them shipped here. Everyone was having the same issue. They got waisting disease of some sort and just died. I had one decent spawn of around 50. Put them entirely by themselves in my 8 footer. Heavily filtered (especially as a fry growout lol) with regular water changes etc and even the fry died (at around 7-10cm). I even got a vet from murdoch university, actually surprised me...he bought his class with him and disected the fish for internal examination and found nothing.

Its sort of gut wrenching to hear you breed them so easily lol

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My last colony was male heavy,, but I'm left with two males and a female now.

Most my fish are kept in smallish tanks, so aggression plays a part, but I'm very good at managing aggression.

I'm sure I'll get another last batch to create my new colony.

I strive to let species almost phase out for a renewal in interest of fish keepers.

Some species are renown for waisting or their fry.

People think, got to keep everything debris free, increased filtration, water changes and bigger tanks.

There are two main things to ensure for success with the troublesome types of species.

1. very high KH of 13 and above.

2. Getting the proteins correct, (correct meat and vegetable ratio).

Specific Malawi foods are high in vegetative ingredients which is high in fiber and passes through fishes guts fast and this is why herbivorous and mainly herbivorous types of omnivores are grazers which graze more often intermittently. (to stay full).

Where as predatory fish need meaty foods that sits in gut longer and metabolism to work correctly in relation.

Though predatory fish need at least 10-20% higher vegetable type foods to resemble vegetable gut loaded prey that does actually assist with correct bowel movement.

Spectrum and sera-flora alone will eventually see these fish fold.

Brine shrimp actually works as a bowel mover also, even though the nutrients are good.

I use a aquatic only base fin fish pellet for predators 80% in total feed,,,,,, Otohime Hirame.

But when giving a required diet like this,,, it's a art to get the correct amount.

Incorrect diet and water chemistry makes fishes susceptible to gram negative bacterias that are always present in the aquarium.

The gram negative bacteria ingested into a stressed fishes gut allows fish to fall victim to infection rather than immune system fighting it off.

Internal infections is a very complicated thing with miriads of infection types showing as the same.

I think Ged or Link posted something that corrolates to this not long ago.

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Yeah, I used to make my own food 15-20 kilo at a time. It certainly wasn't water conditions as I used to also use seachem salts to buff the water. Not so stringent on this these days lol

Yeah I read that link on Mycobacteriosis and I'm suspecting that may have been the issue with mine. As far as I can tell it was an endemic trait of the species as I couldn't find a single person in Australia at the time that wasn't suffering the exact same issues.

Anyway its done now..was just curious.

My apologies for throwing your topic off again firthy.

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Just to clarify,,, I have encountered some waisting issues with them and also yellows at some stage.

I can only assume these were bloodlines that had genetically weak immune systems.

Albinos as we all know are weak,,,, and a good reason why they don't take in the wild (in general).

This weakening allows the gram negative to take hold.

Kind of same effects as you'd see after duration of over stocking.....

I believe that measured out high KH levels allows beneficial bacteria to be at optimum,, and I believe when these bb are working at their best, they outcompete and out number bad bacterias keeping a healthy system,

Keeping problem albinos and Eyellows shows improvement with measured high KH.

Sorry also for bending the topic direction.

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With internal flagellates and various forms of gram negative and gram positive bacterias, even fish turburculosus, once these diseases eat away at internal organs, it's irreversible, only in very very early stages can fish be saved.

Infected decaying organs do not grow back.

I'm one of those people that has lawn like the adverts, the best in the street.

While everyone is battling weeds, spraying weeds, trying to save water, using enviro friendly organic fertilizers, trying to fix half dead thin parts, fighting lawn beetle,,,,,,, lol, I'm just mowing my rediculously lush thick dark green lawn and fertilize twice a year and automated bore water daily in hot season.

Weeds don't stand a chance,,, why ?, because the lawn is so damn healthy it outcompetes anything that tries to grow in it.

Think of the weeds like the bad bacterias, and the lawn like the beneficial bacterias.

The same way I worked out exactly what the lawn needs, is exactly what needs to be worked out what the beneficial bacteria needs.

When the lawn or beneficial bacteria is in its upper most heathy prime,,, there's no room or food left for the weeds and bad bacterias.

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  • 1 year later...

Bringing this one back from the depths....

 

Any updates or more recent pics firthy13?

I've been internally debating the true origins of these fish for the last couple of weeks now ever since I saw another colony that did indeed look very suspect (huge variance in head shapes etc.)

I had never really has reason to question their origin before seeing that particular colony. Mine look and act like genuine blue dolphins and don't resemble these other ones that I saw, even though they all came from Smiths, albeit at different times.

I've even gone so far as to acquire some similar size Cyrtocara moorii and put them into the same tank as my albinos to try to make a better comparison, but after days of staring at the tank the only conclusion I have come to is that the white ones are definitely albino, and maybe its the blue ones that are hybrids :p

 

 

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I would also be keen to see how these fish turned out. I have seen quite a few of these pop up in Perth. I have only seen juveniles, and every batch has at least 10% that have heads that look off to me. My initial thoughts are their has definitely been some hybridisation somewhere along the lines to produce these albinos.

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The albino “moorii” in the hobby were developed from an albino moorii look-a-like that showed up in a shop in Asia.  That fish was bred to normal moori to create the albino “strain”.  It is documented in a thread on one of the overseas forums, by the guy who developed them. 

These fish are definitely not pure.  A good percentage of the fish we are seeing here show very visible egg spots, and some show a red edge to the dorsal fin.  A few show quite definite patterning in the fins.  I suspect the original fish was a moori/peacock cross, as the albinos seem to show some peacock characteristics. 

I’m saddened to see many hobbyists keeping and breeding the albino “moori” with pure moorii, and selling the blue offspring as pure fish.  If the albinos rock your boat, please, please, please treat them as a man-made aquarium strain, and keep them separate from pure strains.  Any blue offspring from a mixed tank need to be treated as hybrids. 

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Thanks for the clarification Humbug. I guess it is one of the those cases, that if it smells like a fish and looks like a fish it is usually a fish. 

The heads and mouths always looked off. I am also yet to see an adult albino moori with a proper nuchal hump, perhaps the most distinguishing feature of large moori. 

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i have attached a few photos of these fish. The dominant male could almost pass as a real moorii. The others though look very much like peacocks. The females do not have any resemblance to a moorii what so ever. I have no intention of breeding them. i am unsure what the future holds for them. i may keep one for a display tank im doing early next year. But the rest, i am not to sure. 

it is disappointing that importers are advertising these as pure strain fish when clearly they would know they are not and the retailers are still flogging these off are pure fish. If they were in an "assorted cichlid" tank at the lfs, fair enough. i think the hobby, in terms of retail stores, has come past the point of no return in regards to profiting from hybrids, but to be knowingly passing these off as pure is unethical IMO.

anyways you win some, you loose some. my quest to find pure albino haps continues.

i apologise for my pathetic attempt of photographing these. A white fish on a white background with white foam under a bare bottom tank presented a few over exposure issues and i didnt have the time to fiddle with settings so i just shot these in auto.

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In their defence, some retailers bought them in good faith when they first became available, and since realising the problem, choose to no longer stock them.  The issue isn’t necessarily obvious when the fish are juvis.
 

I personally believe that many, if not most, of the albino African cichlids in the hobby are hybrids – deliberately created to serve a market that is looking for “something different”.  But some people like them.  Provided that these fish are acknowledged and treated as a man-made “aquarium strain”, then they are no different to dragon bloods, or OB peacocks, or a myriad of other man-made varieties.  The problem comes when they are kept in community tanks from which fry are collected, or worse still, mixed with pure fish and the fry sold as pure.

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