Re: A.atahualpa 'sunset' & Laetacara sp.?

[ProfPhilo@aol.com]

My Buckelkopf are currently in the process of spawning...hurray!
anyhow they match your description of you fish quite well. I read in the 
Linke and Staeke book that the marking behind the eye on these fish is unique 
to Buckelkopfs (at least at the time to book was written) so you may very 
well have these lovely fish. 
Mine have ALOT of bright blue irridescent spots one their bodies -- both male 
and female. I know this because I thought my pair were both males until they 
produced their first spawn =).  mine don't really look identical to the linke 
and staeke pic. The Female ??? does show the red coloring like the picture 
when spawning but the general background color is yellow although I would 
call it more yellowish brown.

As to sexing these guys I have no idea. the 'male' in the above pair is 
developing a 'buckelkopf' (bulge on head) but acts more like what I would 
call a female (spends more time with eggs) and my female looks most like the 
pic.

anyhow all I really know is that I think that they are interesting pretty 
fish. Since everyone else I have that spawns is a cave brooder it's nice to 
have some open brooders to watch.

I also have a pair of atahualpa which have not given me any problems and are 
very attractive little fish. I haven't gotten them to spawn though...  anyone 
elso who has I'd love to know how. ( thanks David) 

for the record my A. mamore spawned a few days ago on the side of a rock were 
the beard algae had formed an artificial 'cave'. They are wrigglers now and 
the mom is terrific. I think that mamore are great fish, one of my favorites 
I would recomend them to anyone. I was very excited when I found the eggs. 
she's been yellow on many occations before but I couldn't ever find any 
babies. 

Just in case anyone wonders all three of the above species are in a densely 
planted 75 gal tank, yeast CO2, peat filtration, tap water, Gh and Kh below 3 
(tetra test) this equals ppm ~ 80-100 ?, pH 5.5  ( it gets up to as high as 
6.5 depending on how religious I am about the peat and CO2). 

Sorry to babble on so, I'm happy to pass on any observations on the fish that 
I have made, 
Tarah


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