Shortbodied Texas

[fraggle]

Wonder if it was an attempt at a "balloon" version?

He is a neat looking little fella though, do you know if they grow as big as the regular Texas?

[William]

Many cichlids have a short bodied type that occurs in the wild as well. It is likely due to a mutation just like melanistic and leutistic fish

[thatcichlidguy]

Neat looking , but deformed. Short bodied fish are the result of a deformity that has been fixed to create this as a strain in many aquarium fish . Like the balloon strains. I used to have a male Salvini with the short bodied deformity, and it doesn't seem to affect them much other than looking odd. If you have him with other Texas though he might get bullied and it might be best to keep him out of any breeding you may do .

[William]

I agree partly with the above but want to stress the presence of short bodied populations of some species in the wild as well. Whether one want to call it a deformity there as well were the fish is able to survive in the wild can be discussed.

[Demjor19]

I am aware that they are a "mutated" version of the normal texas and that many strains of fish have these variants (not only cichlids). I am assuming he is a captive bred Short body fish although william is right...they can/do occur naturally. He also seems to get along fine with the other texas and all other tankmates, but they are being watched closely...as they always are.

thanks for the comments all!

P.s. His blue is really starting to pop now that he is in good water and is on a good diet! i'll update soon!

[troy]

He's very cool looking.

[fraggle]

The Texas are a gorgeous looking fish. I hadn't seen one in "real life" until a couple of months ago, when they had one at one of the LFS's here. He was STUNNING! (He was about 8")

(glad to know that the short bodied versions do occur naturally in the wild without having humans mess around with them for the fun of it too. Good to hear!)

Definatley keep up to date with pics of him as he grows!

[thatcichlidguy]

I agree partly with the above but want to stress the presence of short bodied populations of some species in the wild as well. Whether one want to call it a deformity there as well were the fish is able to survive in the wild can be discussed.

I've seen this in a few new world species , however it's not a normal variant for hericthys species to the best of my knowledge. Theraps species do display this morphology and few others that escape me at the moment. If this individual specimen is in fact tank raised fish I'd consider it a deformity though not a detrimental one since from my own experience with this it , it doesn't cause any real problems for the afflicted fish .

[Sharon]

He's a beautiful little guy!

[Demjor19]

Thanks for the comments all! The thing that makes me happy is that he has a normal mouth...unlike a blood parrots that doesn't close properly or at all in many cases. To me that shows that the "mutation" is not quite as severe or intentional as that of a Blood parrot/jellybean cichlid. Maybe this weekend i'll try to have some new pics up.