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Hi

Does anyone have any personal experience with apistogramma blue steel. I made an impulse purchase on the weekend & was only going to buy one, as they all looked like males to me. None are the drab brown colour I associate with apisto girls. LFS talked me into believing the girls of this species are not brown & sold me 2 he says he is positive are girls. They are pretty fish & I like them anyway, but still think I've been taken for a ride here.

I did a quick google search & couldn't find any pictures of girls, but found one article which told me they are hybrids & the females are not viable & don't survive. I don't know if that's true or not. I wouldn't have knowingly bought hybrids.

If anyone has any personal experience or knowledge of these fish, I'd love to hear it. Thanks in advance.

Cheers
TW

Firstly if the females don't survive they wouldnt lay eggs and therefor there would be no fish to talk about.
Secondly, i've never heard of a blue steel, but do you mean Apistogramma borelli? if so, they are very nice fish, quite peaceful but are quite agressive towards other apistos.
James
p.s. males are bright blue - females are dull brown/grey/yellow.

Hi Mez_again,

thanks for the reply.

Secondly, i've never heard of a blue steel, but do you mean Apistogramma borelli?

I don't think they are borelli, although they look similar & some in the following thread believe they are sometimes sold under that name. http://www.fishforums.net/index.php?s=d5fda4a2b3598f8d1113c0e0c58a9535&showtopic=75697

Here is another picture. http://atlas.drpez.org/Apistogramma-sp-Steel-blue-fotos/aad

Firstly if the females don't survive they wouldnt lay eggs and therefor there would be no fish to talk about

From my investigations so far, this seems to be a contraversial fish. If you're intrested, here is a link to a 5 page forum thread discussing the fish, whether or not it is a hybrid and whether or not there are females.http://www.forum.apistogramma.com/showthread.php?t=849Nothing seems really definite here, other than

* although not 100% confirmed, it's quite likely a hybrid -- grrr

* it's likely that if there are females they are hard to find and

* if females exist, they are very similar in appearance to the males.

* None of the participents of this thread seem think it is related to a borelli.

So far, the only thing I'm sure of about this fish is that I'm unsure of anything.

I'd really love to hear of anyone's personal experience with keeping apistogramma steel blue. Did you have females and were they sterile? Any extra info on how to sex the females would be appreciated.

Thanks again in advance.

Cheers
TW

Robyn,

I know nothing about this fish, but google led me to an entry on the Krib site, usually a rather reliable source.

Here is the rundown:

". sp. Steel Blue is the same as A. sp.
Blue-head/Blaukopf & A. sp. New Blue. This fish
appears to be a man made form. They originally
appeared in Singapore. Matsuzaka (1997) claims
that it is a cross between a caetei-like fish & a
resticulosa-like fish. Females are almost
nonexistent, so if you have a female you are very
lucky. European breeders developed their stock
from wild caetei-like females crossed with Steel
Blue males. Breeding in possible in slightly acid
(~pH 6.0), moderately soft (~5º dGH + dKH) water.
They do not yield many fry, usually 0 (probably
because it is a hybrid)."

And here is the full link: Apisto On Krib

Hope this helps,

Ingo

---

Proud Member of the New Jersey Aquatic Gardeners Club

Hey,

I also found This discussion

Maybe that helps as well

Ingo

---

Proud Member of the New Jersey Aquatic Gardeners Club

Thanks Ingo, it's all very similar to the stuff I've read. All comments are varied & nothing seems for sure. The comments I find include:-

* May be a hybrid, with guesses as to the mix of species used
* may not be a hybrid & suggested collection points mentioned
* no surviving females from the cross spawn, which must mean that some breeder/s somewhere are continually breeding males with a cross - otherwise, stock would die out
* females withheld by breeder (but no believable theory is apparent to support this)
* females are available, but not often
* claims by some to have females and raised fry

I suspect it must be a hybrid - shame as they are pretty fish. If it is really true that there are no females, or very few it almost seems like the LFS told me a fib. He swore that they were wild collected, that he bought some himself for his home tank and they had eggs within days. He swore blind that he gave me 2 females for sure.

Oh well, they are all in the community tank - and fry never survive in that tank anyway My Apisto Steel Blues will simply be nice ornamental fish.

I still would like to hear from anyone on this forum who has kept them, but it seems unlikely.

Thanks for helping out with a google search Ingo.

Cheers
TW

Some appearance & behavioral activity observed - just to mix things up a bit.

Two of these fish, while still not brown or yellow like a usual female, is much paler (or whiter) in appearance. You know that horizontal black stripe often apistos have - well it is so faint that it's almost not there.

Maybe that was why LFS believed they are both girls. It by no means proves anything and doesn't convince me they are girls, but it is interesting.

At least one of the paler fish is consistently chasing the prettiest apisto of the bunch, who has a very strong horizontal black strip through the middle of his body. He is also quite a bit smaller in size than the others. This chasing doesn't appear to be aggression, but only an attempt to get close enough to do that submissive shimmy shake thing apisto girls often do.

Now, is this a sub dominant male, trying desperately to get in the good books with the prettier male. The prettier & smaller male fish is not interested at all and, while not acting like a wimp, seems to want to swim away from his admirer to be left in peace.

Cheers
TW

The photo from the Dr Pez link looks remarkably like the fish that was featured in the venerable Innes book under the name Apistogramma pertense, but the taxonomny of the apistogramma species has undergone such radical upheavals in the intervening years that there is no guarantee that Innes' old fish has the same name, or hasn't even been split into several species!

Here are some illustrations from The Cichlid Room that may prove useful:

Apistogramma borellii

Apistogramma caetei

From Apistogramma.com we have:

Apistogramma borellii "opal"

My old Braz Walker pocket book has Apistogramma borellii listed as apistogramma reitzigi, and an entirely DIFFERENT species (one of the cacatuoides group) listed as Apistogramma borellii, just to confuse matters severely ...

Given that we already have something like 50+ described Apistogramma species in Nature, another 20 or so awaiting scientific description, many of them stunningly beautiful in their own right, I don't see the need for hybrids. I hope this fish ISN'T a hybrid, because it would be a pity for such a nice fish to have such a sad provenance.


Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

Calilasseia, thanks for the help and the links.

I went back up to look at some of the links I put in one of my posts and found it wasn't working.

If case anyone's intrested, here's the link again. It's a 5 page forum thread amongst a bunch of hobbyist, debating whether or not it is a hybrid and whether or not there are females.http://www.forum.apistogramma.com/showthread.php?t=849 Nothing is clear.

Cheers
TW