Thursday morn'n cup...

[Mugwump]

....and the coffee is so good, I believe that I'll have another cup.. .....chilly morn'n again....brrr

[GraphicGr8s]

Even I hit 2 cups today. First home brew then DD.

[BallAquatics]

43 ?F here this morning.  The chill in the air makes you feel great to be alive.  I love this weather!

Gonna do some re-arranging in the fish room and try to put some of my new-found tanks into service for winter time breeding projects.

I need to get more fry from my Devario pathirana



Devario acrostomus



and Devario xyrops



The Devario xyrops are quite attractive when they are young but grown into rather dull lookig grey fish.  We got the adults as a by catch and they may never be imported again.  It would be nice to keep a few breeding groups here in the US just because.....

Dennis

[PaulineMi]

Great pictures Dennis. 

D. pathirana appear to express a random pattern of stripes and spots but all are blue on an orange background on my screen.  There is an irana rainbowfish that is vibrant red. Do "pathirana" and "irana" have any commonalities such as perhaps the person first finding and describing them.

[BallAquatics]

Thanks Pauline.

Devario pathirana was named for Ananda Pathirana who made the authors aware of the new species.  I know nothing when it comes to rainbow fish, perhaps a search on the scientific name would turn up a connection.....

Dennis

[Ron Sower]

Time for my cup now. I'm going to hit a couple or 3 fish stores today. One new one opened in downtown (ugh) Seattle a couple months ago and I haven't been there yet, so it really is time for me to get in there. He's supposed to have a great selection of plants and some not-so-common fish species.

BTW, your photos are amazing,Dennis!

[PaulineMi]

Thanks Pauline.

Devario pathirana was named for Ananda Pathirana who made the authors aware of the new species.  I know nothing when it comes to rainbow fish, perhaps a search on the scientific name would turn up a connection.....

Dennis

After doing google searches it appears the similarities in species names is coincidental. 

[BallAquatics]

Thanks Ron.  Sounds like a fun day visiting the fish stores.

Dennis

[Mugwump]

Thanks Ron.  Sounds like a fun day visiting the fish stores.

Dennis

Any day visiting fish stores can be fun..... ...excluding 'big box stores' , of course....

[BillT]

Wow Dennis,

Nice fish!
I have never even seen the D. acrostomus or the D. xyrops in person.

Where did those come from?

[BallAquatics]

Where did those come from?

Both are quite a story.....

I was so amazed when I came into possession of the Devario acrostomus that I fired off an email to Pete Cottle.  Pete said that he had never seen a Devario acrostomus in the flesh,  which I must say,  just made my day, but he did have some info about their collection.  It seems the fish were originally caught  in the wild by Kamphol Udomritthiruj of AquariCORP.  Kamphol, by the way , is the man who first found the Celestial Pearl Danio back in 2006.  Next the fish went to this fellow named Patrick Yap who runs a company called Aquaculture Technologies in Singapore.  From there they went to Steve Lundblad at the Wet Spot in Portland Oregon.  When Steve gets something of interest or something they can't ID he contacts my friend Stephan Tanner at Swiss Tropicals.  Needless to say the fish then when to Stephan and soon found their way into my tanks.

As for the D. xyrops, they were a by catch that came into Aqua-global in Germany.  Ingo Seidel, of catfish fame, works there and is also a good friend of Stephan.  Stephan brought them to the US, and then when he was in the process of relocating, gave them to me.  There were four wild fish originally, but I lost one and now have 2 females and a single male.

I've got both to spawn, which Pete says is most certainly a first, but have very few F1's of either species at the moment.  With a bit of luck over the winter, I hope to have enough next spring to start spreading them around.

Naturally, Stephan would be first on the list to receive fish, but I also thought you or perhaps Dave Parichy might also be very interested.  It's hard to tell if or when these might make another appearance here in the states.

Here are the young D. acrostomus.....


And here are the young D. xyrops.....


Dennis

[Mugwump]

Yes, that's quite the story. Congrat's on your success with them...after all that traveling, I amazed at their vigor.....that in itself is a story...good luck over the winter. 

[Ron Sower]

Time for my cup now. I'm going to hit a couple or 3 fish stores today. One new one opened in downtown (ugh) Seattle a couple months ago and I haven't been there yet, so it really is time for me to get in there. He's supposed to have a great selection of plants and some not-so-common fish species.

BTW, your photos are amazing,Dennis!

Followup on yesterdays adventure..... Great day! Hit the first store up in Everett and was happy to pick up some skunk and panda cories, plant tabs and some new filter media to try. Supposed to remove phosphates from water. I have too much algae. We'll see if it's just a marketing gimmick to sell garbage or not.

Then went on to Aquarium Zen. This belongs to Steve Waldron who's been in our club long before I got into it. He's a very laid back fellow and had probably 20 tanks on individual stands or on the floor and cabinets in his small home apartment. Each tank was fastidiously aquascaped, cleanly maintained, and stocked with many species of non-common fish from all over the world. Now his store is exactly like that. It's a place where you want to go and just stay and observe his aquaria. He is the only ADA distributor around. He has the rimless ADA tanks for his display and selling tanks. I picked up several medium light plants and a cross between a German Blue and Gold Ram female. My 2 males ought to take some interest.

Then we went to a 3rd familiar older typical shop where I got 10 chili rasboras to occupy a 5g that i've restarted.

What a day it was!

[Mugwump]

...it sounds like you had a very nice relaxing tour.... .....