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You do realise, Cory_Addict, that if you persuade these critters to spawn, you'll probably be the first person ever to do so?

Get to it!

Oh, and Sirbooks, I just checked my Burgess' Mini-Atlas of Marine Fishes. it illustrates the following species:

Cirrhitichthys aprinus
Cirrhitichthys oxycephalus
Cirrhitichthys guichenoti
Cirrhitus rivulatus
Cirrhitus splendens
Neocirrhitus armatus
Cirrhitops fasciatus
Paracirrhites arcuatus
Paracirrhites hemistictus
Paracirrhites forsteri
Paracirrhites xanthus
Oxycirrhites typus
Amblycirrhitus pinos
Amblycirrhitus earnshawi
Amblycirrhites (?) bimacula

NONE of them have cirri above the eyes. One of my illustrations DOES show such a structure around the nostrils of one of the illustrated fishes (namely Paracirrhites armatus but not above the eyes.

This piece from Reefcentral is apposite (the link to the requisite article is here :

Some characteristics which are common to all of these fish are the cirri, or hair-like tufts of tissue, that are present on the top of each of the 10 dorsal spines and behind the nostrils. All Hawkfish also have 14 rays in the pectoral fins, a single, crenated dorsal fin, 26 – 28 vertebrae, two spines on the operculum, and lack an air bladder (Fishbase). Lastly, all Hawkfish start life as females and transform into males when needed (Donaldson, 1989).

Last edited by Calilasseia at 08-Nov-2005 18:31

Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

They are in my 50 gallon community tank.

They seem to hide a lot, but they did that at the store too, so I think that's just how they are. They don't seem to be aggressive and the other fish don't pick on them either.

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

Are they being housed with any other fish? If so, how are they getting along?

Last edited by sirbooks at 12-Nov-2005 22:06

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And when he gets to Heaven, to Saint Peter he will tell: "One more Marine reporting, Sir! I've served my time in Hell."

Awesome...

Today I saw one of them (for the first time in about three days), so I popped a couple cubes of frozen bloodworms in. I saw it eat some, which is great because I haven't seen any of them eat since they were at the store.

Hopefully I can get them to equate coming out in the open with getting food.

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

I agree with Cup Of lifenoodles.
Totally the most cutest fish ever!
That is so adorable!
You should try breeding them! I would love
some of those guys in the future!


Come Play Yahtzee With Me!
http://games.atari.com
Http://www.myleague.com/yahtgames

Cutest fish ever.

Here's some good news:

"Hi Natalie,

As we know so little about these fish, they may actually prefer fresh water. Hard to know what salinity they prefer. If they are eating well in freshwater, then you should probably keep them where they are.

--Jeff"

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

"NONE of them have cirri above the eyes."

Right, but I never did say that. Saltwater blennies can have the eye cirri, but hawkfish mainly have cirri on their dorsal rays, as your link stated.

That's a pretty nice find Natalie, sounds like you're pretty lucky to get some fish that are so rare. Good luck with them.

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And when he gets to Heaven, to Saint Peter he will tell: "One more Marine reporting, Sir! I've served my time in Hell."

They are very cool, but I'm not sure how long they can live in freshwater. Oh well, it just gives me more of a reason to set up my brackish hex tank...

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

Very cool find on a rare species Natalie !

Neat little critters by the looks of them

Once you've had them and know more about their behavior and needs etc, perhaps you can do up a profile for FP !



The Amazon Nut...

I bought some small blennies today, but I have no idea what species they are. They were simply on the availability list as "Freshwater Blenny", which doesn't help much. They are about 2" long, with long, pointed snouts (unlike most blennies). They have bold vertical stripes the entire length of their body.

I have searched online and found nothing, so I am hoping that if somebody has some big fish atlases if they could see if they are in there.





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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

I got an email back from Jeff Williams, the Fishbase Collaborator for the family Blenniidae:

"Hi Natalie,

Thanks for sending the nice photos of a Phenablennius heyligeri blenny. These are the first color photos I have ever seen of this species. The photographed specimen looks like a female with the banding pattern. The males may lose the bands when mature, but we don't know what colors might develop when breeding. This blenny species is very poorly known and there are only 8 preserved specimens known in museum collections. The species has been reported in the scientific literature from Borneo, Sumatra, and Cambodia, but is obviously more common as it is now available in the aquarium trade.

If any of the specimens die, you should pop them into 10% formalin or 75% ethanol and donate them to a museum fish collection.

Thanks,
--Jeff"

I'm still going to inquire about their captive care needs, but I'm glad I finally found out what species they were.

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

I found this...

[link=http://tropicalfishgallery.com/species-gallery/misc/Combtooth.html]http://tropicalfishgallery.com/species-gallery/misc/Combtooth.html" style="COLOR: #FFFFFF[/link]

Apparently they are being sold as "Vietnamese Blennies". It's not much help with no scientific name or anything, but it's a start...

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

Unless I'm mistaken, all hawkfish have cirri too. They're in the family Cirrhitidae, after all. I'm also pretty sure that they are all marine. So, it can't be them.

Last edited by sirbooks at 07-Nov-2005 06:26

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And when he gets to Heaven, to Saint Peter he will tell: "One more Marine reporting, Sir! I've served my time in Hell."

Heh, i thought it looked like a hawkfish when i saw it too, so you're not TOTALLY loony cali.

I'm pretty sure it's a true blenny.

There appears to be many species of blennies that don't have any cirri, and even some with elongated snouts, but none of them look like mine.

I think I'm going to contact the Fishbase Coordinator for the family Blenniidae...

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

I've spent an hour trying to track these critters down.

So far, I know they're not Goby type fishes (Gobiidae or Eleotridae) because both of those families have a clear division between the hard rayed and soft rayed dorsal fins, while this fish has a unitary dorsal fin;

After scouring all the Blennoid fishes, i'm convinced it isn't actually one of those, unless it's a very odd one i've never encountered before. Partly because many of the true Blennies have comb-like structures called cirri above the eyes, which this fish lacks. In the case of the other Blennoid fishes, the mouth structure and head morphology differs considerably from this fish.

So, after something like 9 Families and 400+ species, I've also ruled out the Microdesmidae (Fireflash Gobies or Firefishes).

The nearest thing I can find that resembles your fish is - wait for it - a Hawkfish. Which should be completely wrong, because as far as I know, all the Hawkfishes (Family Cirrhitidae) are marine coral reef fishes. Unless there is a freshwater representative of the Family, and you happen to have bought it!


Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

Hmm... Can't say as I know what it is either, but, I would be interesting in learning more about them. As they are some really cute little critters.

_____________________________________________________________

There is always a bigger fish...

One of them finally came out, so I was able to get some good pictures.





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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.