Re: [RML] australis "Drysdale"

Gary Lange (gwlange at stlnet.com)
Fri, 23 May 1997 20:17:58 -0500

The fish that was distributed thru Ekkwill as 8 lined red tailed, at
one time was an australis that Heiko sold to them. Since he never
bothered to tell anyone about the exact location where he collect the
fish it is a mystery. they are indeed thicker bodied that the
Drysdales that we obtained through Ron. They almost looked splendida
in size and shape. In some ways that fish is brighter in color than
the Drysdales that we had obtained through Ron Bowman. I have, over
the years obtained some 16 fish that grew up that were all males,
except for one female that refuses to lay even a single egg, and is
very sorry looking. Our RSG editor, Kevin Hosmer also grew some
dozen of these fish without producing a single female. I think that
perhaps this particular fish needs to be raised in water that is much
harder than my water (125 ppm or at least higher in pH) to produce
acceptable sex ratios. In the past there has been a "trend" for more
males to be produced in water that isn't quite so hard, that is that
tends to go acid easier and for more females to be produced from
water that is more alkaline, and perhaps harder. Whether this
"trend" is real or just imagined really remains to be proven,
hopefully with some proper controls. The cichlid people for years
have lived in a fantasy world believing that Apisto spawns had their
sex ratios greatly affectly by the pH of when the fry were conceived.
A german, Uwe Romer, pretty well shattered that theory when he
showed that the single most important factor was instead temperature.
Hopefully we won't settle into any of these myths of our own but
keep them out their as "theories" until proven otherwise.

Gary Lange
gwlange at STLNET.com
Rainbowfish Study Group of North America
http://home.stlnet.com/~gwlange/rainbowfish.index.html
Convention info at: http://www.sfaquarium.org

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From: Jack W. Betz <Jack_Betz at msn.com>
To: rainbowfish at pcug.org.au
Subject: [RML] australis "Drysdale"
Date: Friday, May 23, 1997 2:53 PM

Roy, et al,
I guess the drysdale-like fish I have must be one of them there
Florida
mongrels. They were one of the first bows I found at a local fish
shop about 3
years ago. The commercial name was " 8 Lined Red Tail Rainbows ". M.
s.
australis "Drysdale" photo on cover of "Best of RSG" is very, very
close to
what they looked like when I first got them, but now they have more
intense
blue on backs with more distinct belly stripes, and solid red tails.
They do
show some morphological differences within spawns, sometimes
strangely
parkinsoni-ish, and I have been selecting for bright blue backs with
solid red
tails. Just my own personal project ya know.

----------
From: owner-rainbowfish at pcug.org.au on behalf of Roy Hunter
Sent: Friday, May 23, 1997 9:27 AM
To: rainbowfish at pcug.org.au
Subject: Re: [RML] scavengers (fish)

Jack, from What Gary has told me there were never both sexes of the
Drysdale river australis in the country, they just "looked" like
them.
I had seen the ones going around as the drysdales and they didn't
look
anything like the fish I brought back that I received from the man
who
collected them originally.

Roy Hunter
Co-Chairman
ANGFA of North America
visit the ANGFA website at:
http://www.angfa.org
reach me at:
roy at angfa.org

----------
> From: Jack W. Betz <Jack_Betz at msn.com>
> To: rainbowfish at pcug.org.au
> Subject: RE: [RML] scavengers (fish)
> Date: Thursday, May 22, 1997 7:19 PM
>
> Jim,
> My G. incisus were always good bottom feeders, when I had them.
Also M.
> splendida australis "Drysdale River" will pick the bottom alot.
>
> Jack