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Thanks for your patience everyone.

Shari


I mentioned my Kub expansion before, here are some pics.

These guys spent an honest month in the quarantine, and at the beginning I was not optimistic about keeping them all alive: pretty heavy ich, not just ich marks, but heavy breathing, fairly skinny, so I figured: get all four, keep two alive. As far as Ich goes, this was the easiest Ich yet: fully cured in three days, a day faster than last time (I'll explain one day exactly how this was done, the procedure is still being tuned). Surprisingly, all made it, which creates a bit of overpopulation.

After a couple of disasters, I'm tempted to quarantine for two months, but with these guys, quarantining was also dangerous: three 4" Kubs and one nearly 3" madly running in a 10g and occasionally jumping out of the water...it became obvious that some of them will end up on the way...so one month hopefully should do. Not that I had any reasons to suspect them once ich was gone.....

Here are the larger ones:





The 3" one is not particularly interesting...I just felt sorry for it at the store...it was pretty much doomed if I were to leave it there. And since the fish was free of charge too, I took all....

It appears that all the smaller Kubs here deserted to the newcomers: they try to follow them as the new guys explore the tank. For comparison, here are the new Kubs (top/left) with the old ones (bottom/right):



The current Alpha and Beta did not join in welcoming and are hiding (except for a very quick trip to take a look ) ...Most likely a different kind of reception is being prepared. Some violence in 2-3 days is expected.

If I'm around, I'll try to film it...when 3"-4" Kubs do it, it is quite impressive (they were doing it in the 10g qtank too...that looked like a boxing match in a utility closet).

The current Alpha actually has a chance of keeping its position: it is only a bit over 3", but it has more girth and is fatter too. These new guys' proportions are a bit off, and they are also still on the skinny side. Much better than at the beginning, but this last photo shows that they are not in the top shape:

Hi Milev, nice pics ! what i like about 3rd pic , with the four fishes is , it seems to show the sex differences , the bigger 2 on the left , have much longer snouts [noses] than the 2 lower ones ! anyway good luck with the care and i'm sure you will grow them on into superb adults .

Hi Piggy4,

Thank you. I don't think this is a sexual difference, more likely regional.

For comparison, here is the Alpha:



(Older photo, it is mostly hiding now). There are several differences:
1. The head shape.
2. The body shape: these new guys are really more elongated, Alpha was reasonably rounded even when I got (her?).
3. Dot pattern: both Alpha and Beta have single columns of small dots.
4. Behavior: none of the older Kubs is topfeeding...in fact I never saw a Kub > 1" that would topfeed. The new loaches are all topfeeding right now, smaller loaches follow them up but not to the water line. Maybe they are hungry, but they really have no reasons to be after a month of daily bloodworms.
5. All new ones have this elongated Tiger-like face, unlike any Kubs I've owned/seen before.

So I suspect they simply started catching in a new location.

BTW, there was an earlier discussion about long- and short- faced clowns...a very similar phenomenon.

Wow, great looking fish

Thank you Whitey!



And now some "R" rated material:

I'll sit on the fence on this one , i thought the males were longer in the nose ! anyway i'm enjoying your superb documentation of these wonderful fish , keep the pics coming , i'll never get bored ha ha .

Lovely pics Mike

I have 4 Kub's at the moment and they are all different in spot patterns, head shapes etc. It does seem strange that there can be so many differences between fish of the same species.

Thanks, guys,

Mad, I'm to Kubs is what you are to Sids Unfortunately, I will not be able to keep this as a single-species tank, I still have Striata's in another qtank, and they will end up here when I feel brave enough about moving them (they are <1.5", so the largest Striata is smaller than the smallest Kub...)

On variety of patterns: I've noticed that Kubs obtained at the same time tend to be more similar than those from different places....there ought be a large collection point factor.

Darn. It looks like I'll miss a big show today: the Alpha started testing new guys, making short runs on them -- they retreat so far. Really tempting to skip job and watch....

Very weird.... no fighting at all today, and no indication that they are going to. Maybe in a large crowd aggression totally dissipates? (cf. Barbs).

The Alpha did a few runs, but she cannot very well chase everybody, so she got bored and simply re-joined the crowd.

Except for the BIG problem seen below everybody seems happy...

awesome shots!

Hi Milev , just going back to the sex thing , do the longer snouted Kubs have longer pectoral fins ? i think this also could be a male trait ?

Thank you, LO. Striata' are likely to join them some time soon, there will be more pics then...

piggy4 wrote:Hi Milev , just going back to the sex thing , do the longer snouted Kubs have longer pectoral fins ? i think this also could be a male trait ?

I think there is something to it. To make sure, I'll have to make individual photos, but it appears that the long snout guys have pectoral fins that are perhaps 20% longer than pelvic, whereas the others, including the ones I think are females, have both pairs of about the same size.

But this does not establish any connection to sex, only a correlation between long snouts and long pectoral fins, again likely geographic.

OK, I'll try to collect photos, but the best way may be to wait 2-3 months and see if any of the long snout ones fattens into gravidity ... right now, no sign of it.

(Mike, not Mile)

PS.

Piggy4,

Here is my current sense of Kub varieties.

There seems to be three types:

1. "White" Kubotai, these are the ones that look almost like histrionica's when at 1"-1.5", and even at 2.5" remain mostly white. Some of them even miss the horizontal connection (I posted a photo of one like this before).

2. "Black" Kubotai, these have a single vertical line of small dots, and seem to be short-faced. My 3" Alpha and Beta are of this type.

3. "Multiline" Long-snout Kubotai, all of my new ones are of this type.

You likely see 1. as juv's, 2. as females, and 3. as males ... I doubt this because in most Kub groups I've seen sold, there is a clear prevalence of one type.... That 1. contains many juvs is clear, but I think there is also a distinct type, I have type 1 Kubs of 2"+.

For example, the Kubs I got in March 2006 were of type 2, all the Kubs I got month ago are of type 3.... and type 3 seems to be the least common.

The pictures on LOL are all of types 1 and 2 with the exception of this one:

which seems to be type 3 and (alas!) we cannot see its face and it seems it is not a Kub owned by anyone here.

Anyway, this is interesting, and I'm going to look at more Kub photos... maybe it is worthwhile asking people who have 2.5"+ Kubs to post pics and look at them carefully.

Thanks for the interaction Milev , it is much appreciated, and of great value in the understanding of this species, i only wish i could take pics , but alas , i am relying on the photographic skills of yourself , and others .

Thank you!

This is very interesting.

I'll try to photo a couple of particular Kubs to show what I mean..could not do it today.

Now, for the moment of HORROR.

I saw the tank littered with bloodworms today and loaches trying to eat them and spitting them out:



Now, a loach that rejects bloodworms ought to be dying...they were not dying, simply unhappy....then it occurred to me that I did not feed them bloodworms.... what I did, I fed the pleco watermelon...a lot of it.

The entire tank was covered with imitation bloodworms....and they thought these were real...

No more watermelon...