Re: Sacrimontis or pulcher ?

[Mike & Diane Wise <apistowise@bewellnet.com>]

Simon,

Here's my 2¢ worth. I agree with Gary. I believe Pv. sacrimontis is still an
invalid name and probably now nomen nudem, since Linke & Staeck published the
name in their book without any scientific description. Dr. Loiselle considers it
valid by their reference to an unpublished paper by Thys (Pv. sacrimontis Thys in
Linke & Staeck 1981). This, I feel is pushing a scientific name beyond the limit.
A lot of this, I am sure, is due to Loselle's loyalty to Thys, his old mentor.
For now I call it Pv. sp. aff. pulcher, the Giant Krib.

Contrary to Gary, I believe that the Giant Krib is a species separate from the
Common Krib, Pv. pulcher. The Giant Krib is a soft water upland species. The
Common Krib is more generally distributed throughout the Niger delta. The Giant
Krib can grow to 6"/15cm while the Common Krib rarely exceeds 4"/10cm. The two
species can be separated by color on the tail and gill cover. The Giant Krib will
always show a turquoise stripe below the eye and on the gill cover. The males
have a turquoise band that borders the outer red band on the upper lobe of the
tail fin. None of the many color forms of the Common Krib show this turquoise
color on the face or tail.

I have never heard of any interbreeding but I imagine it is possible if the fish
are given no choice. Kribs are notoriously slow to pair off. I've had Common
Kribs take 6 months or more before the urge to breed started. Then again, I've
had Common Kribs breed within a few weeks. The fish are all individuals in this
respect.

Check your female & new male for the turquoise on the gill & tail. If it is
there, you have a wonderful fish that needs to be bred in captivity. The rain
forest of its home waters is rapidly being cut down for agricultural land. The
Giant Krib is now in danger of disappearing in the wild due to habitat loss. The
Giant Krib will breed in water similar to the Common Krib, but sex ratios tend to
be skewed radically. It is best to breed this fish in moderately soft water at a
pH around 6.3 to insure roughly equal numbers of male & females. Hope this helps.

Mike Wise

Simon Voorwinde wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> I've got a few questions so I'll just list them;
>
> 1. Will sacrimontis hybridise with pulcher ? The reason I ask is that I have
> a beautiful male pulcher that I had spent a long time searching for a nice
> female for. I finally found one and placed them together and so far
> nothing - not even the slightest display by the female and they have been
> together about 2 months. I bought her in a shop that was full of nice big
> males that I thought looked rather nice. Some had tail spots others didn't.
> I bought a nice male for a friend that had one tail spot, no dorsal spots,
> but a broad black patch on his dorsal. I put the new big male in with my
> pair to settle down before my friend picked it up in a day or two and the
> instant I let him free the female I originally had turned almost black,
> coloured up and began arching and quivering in front of the new male. Of
> course the two males began to fight requiring separation.  Do you think I
> could have bought a sacrimontis by mistake and does this explain why the
> original pair didn't begin to spawn ?
>
> 2. A book I have has a pic of Pelvicachromis cf. pulcher that has lots more
> red than a pulcher, is bigger and is stated to be more robust and vigorous.
> I this the same as P. sacrimontis ?
>
> 3. The book also says that there is two distinct forms of cf. pulcher - one
> that is covered with red from the mouth to the anal fin and another which
> has red colouring similar to P. pulcher. The new male I have has a red strip
> about 3mm long along the edge of the bottom jaw. Question is how do you tell
> male and female P. sacrimontis from P. pulcher ?
>
> I have pics of both if that will help.
>
> TIA
>
> Simon Voorwinde
> http://thecichlidtank.cjb.net
>
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