Hello all, I am relatively new here, and this is one of my first posts.
About a years and a half ago I stumbled acroos a pet store that had Pink Jack Dempseys. It was the first ime I have ever seen them or heard of them. The fish at the time were too small for my tanks inhabitants(Pike, Larger Dempseys, and a paid of Oscars)...So, still intrigued by them, I cleaned out my tank for less than a quarter of what I paid for my fish and purchased the trio of Dempseys.
The fish I quickly learned were much more skiddish than reguler Dempseys, and literally took about a week to start feeding. Pleany or room in the tank(110 Oceanic) and plenty of places to hide, sunken ships, caves etc. What I had found was these fish literally took weeks to actually come out when I was present. Eventually they started coming around.
About 3 months in the new home, I came home to only find two of them. Couldn't figure out where the 3rd was, until I looked all the way at the top near the canister in the back to find one half out of the water and beaten up pretty good. I went to my local pet shop, and purchase a new home being he was on his last leg, I figured it was my only chance to save him. After removing him, I got to watch a couple of weeks of my male chasing my female around, being overly aggressive, and then acting like a total show off. The pair dug out every bit of gravel under one of the sunken ships, and my mle proceeded to go into wild convulsions over the area. I figured out pretty quick what was going on.
Eventually, I had a tank full of fry. I made some adjustments to the filtration so I wasn't sucking any of the fry up in the filter, and within time I had a tank of about 75 Pink Dempseys. All of the offspring were Pink, which I was told I would probably have some Blue's mixed in. That didn't happen.
Three tanks later, my original pair became breeding machines. I have them on population control now, and also added a pair of EBJD's to the mix.
What I have found out about the EBJD's was they were not as skiddish as the Pinks. They had more personality, and of course much better coloration. But...they did not grow at the same rate of the Pinks. I held onto 10 Pinks, and cherry picked them for coloration. Three of which are orange, and actually look more like a Red Devil or snook than thier pink parents. Anyway, my baby pinks which I was concerned about keeping with the much bigger Blues, quickly caught up in size, and some are ow bigger. So, I paired up the 2 Blue Males, 1 smaller Pink Male, and 2 Female Pinks in the hopes that the dominant Blue male would find a suitable partner in the Pinks. This project is about to be an epic fail, why? My Male Pink, and my Dominant Blue Male have taken over, and act much like my bredding pair of Pinks in the big tank. So now, myhopes are that maybe, somehow I sexed them wrong, and my dominant Blue male is actually a female. But I am almost positive that my Blue is a male with the shape of his longer pointy fins, and somewhat lack of cororation in the face. If not, maybe I just may have the first pair of confused Jack Dempseys in the history of the fish. Or...my question is this. Is it possible that this is somewhat common for anyone with experience bredding Jacks?
Lastly, if there is anyone in the NY area that is interested in trading, or adopting(if that sort of thing goes on in here) I would be greatly interested in a female Blue, preferrable an adult or subadult in a trade for some of the pinks.
If anyone has any suggestions in pairing off one of my Blues with one of the Pinks please let me know... I would love all the feedback I can get here.
About a years and a half ago I stumbled acroos a pet store that had Pink Jack Dempseys. It was the first ime I have ever seen them or heard of them. The fish at the time were too small for my tanks inhabitants(Pike, Larger Dempseys, and a paid of Oscars)...So, still intrigued by them, I cleaned out my tank for less than a quarter of what I paid for my fish and purchased the trio of Dempseys.
The fish I quickly learned were much more skiddish than reguler Dempseys, and literally took about a week to start feeding. Pleany or room in the tank(110 Oceanic) and plenty of places to hide, sunken ships, caves etc. What I had found was these fish literally took weeks to actually come out when I was present. Eventually they started coming around.
About 3 months in the new home, I came home to only find two of them. Couldn't figure out where the 3rd was, until I looked all the way at the top near the canister in the back to find one half out of the water and beaten up pretty good. I went to my local pet shop, and purchase a new home being he was on his last leg, I figured it was my only chance to save him. After removing him, I got to watch a couple of weeks of my male chasing my female around, being overly aggressive, and then acting like a total show off. The pair dug out every bit of gravel under one of the sunken ships, and my mle proceeded to go into wild convulsions over the area. I figured out pretty quick what was going on.
Eventually, I had a tank full of fry. I made some adjustments to the filtration so I wasn't sucking any of the fry up in the filter, and within time I had a tank of about 75 Pink Dempseys. All of the offspring were Pink, which I was told I would probably have some Blue's mixed in. That didn't happen.
Three tanks later, my original pair became breeding machines. I have them on population control now, and also added a pair of EBJD's to the mix.
What I have found out about the EBJD's was they were not as skiddish as the Pinks. They had more personality, and of course much better coloration. But...they did not grow at the same rate of the Pinks. I held onto 10 Pinks, and cherry picked them for coloration. Three of which are orange, and actually look more like a Red Devil or snook than thier pink parents. Anyway, my baby pinks which I was concerned about keeping with the much bigger Blues, quickly caught up in size, and some are ow bigger. So, I paired up the 2 Blue Males, 1 smaller Pink Male, and 2 Female Pinks in the hopes that the dominant Blue male would find a suitable partner in the Pinks. This project is about to be an epic fail, why? My Male Pink, and my Dominant Blue Male have taken over, and act much like my bredding pair of Pinks in the big tank. So now, myhopes are that maybe, somehow I sexed them wrong, and my dominant Blue male is actually a female. But I am almost positive that my Blue is a male with the shape of his longer pointy fins, and somewhat lack of cororation in the face. If not, maybe I just may have the first pair of confused Jack Dempseys in the history of the fish. Or...my question is this. Is it possible that this is somewhat common for anyone with experience bredding Jacks?
Lastly, if there is anyone in the NY area that is interested in trading, or adopting(if that sort of thing goes on in here) I would be greatly interested in a female Blue, preferrable an adult or subadult in a trade for some of the pinks.
If anyone has any suggestions in pairing off one of my Blues with one of the Pinks please let me know... I would love all the feedback I can get here.
Its just a color morph for sure, but I'm curious of what it looks like.
