What type of Sev is this?
- Thread starter Aqualoon
- Start date
looks like an effaciatus male to me. Never kept them myself, so can't say if that is what they always look like.
I've seen that picture multiple times and my feeling is that it's been color adjusted/enhanced. The closest I have seen to that would be a nice male notatus, but they won't show blue in the face. They will have deep yellow throats and chests with green-blue on the body and covered in black spots.
Actually, I have a severum that looks exactly like this, and have been trying to figure out what kind it is for several months, unsuccessfully. I have never seen any other photo of it online, no matter what I tried to search as, until this very thread. So it's good to know someone else has this odd looking sev. Mine has that exact bluish hue with the red spots. I would love to know what it is called, because it does not look like my turquoise sev at all. I'll be watching this thread develop for sure.
I'll take a pic when I can... may be a few days, as I am going to try to borrow a camera good enough to take a pic better than my phone can.
-Rich
Most "turquoise" males will have a blue face with dark red markings. My turquoise male had them. The problem is that turquoise severums (H. appendiculatus) are no longer considered their own species. Everything is now considered H. efasciatus. I still don't believe that this is a good idea because there are noticeable differences in the two, but at this point they're all considered regional/color variants of the same species.
To take it a step further, rotkeils appear to be "turquoise" severums with a red neck. They also get the blue face. This color will vary from fish to fish, and also based on their mood, tank lighting, etc. Sometimes it's very vibrant blue, sometimes it's dark, so on and so forth.
Notatus males will also have dark red spots on their cheeks while the rest of the spots are black. The difference with notatus is that they have spots rather than striations and they don't often have the blue face color like rotkeils and "turquoise."