Today I went to a lfs to get another banjo catfish I came across a tank of blind cave tetras and I noticed some of them have eyes! Just awfully tiny eyes. I thought the blind cave tetras are supposed be lack of eyes when adult?
Blind cave fish...eyeless or not?
- Thread starter MN_Rebel
- Start date
Are they found naturally in caves or bred selectively to be this way?
Either way, it's possible they simply haven't fully adapted into eyelessness, and still occasionally have vestigial eyes.
This would strike me as more likely if their genetics are due largely to human intervention, but such things happen in nature too.
Either way, it's possible they simply haven't fully adapted into eyelessness, and still occasionally have vestigial eyes.
This would strike me as more likely if their genetics are due largely to human intervention, but such things happen in nature too.
They are found in the caves naturally. This is first time I noticed the eyes. One has fully formed eyes but still tiny. The others has either one fully formed eye or just a black spot under the skin. This group is different from others I seen in the past.
Or maybe I had this crazy theory.....since cave tetras are bred in the captivity these days that they starts to revert backwards
to the eyed form?
Wow that is a cool concept. Maybe even like, normal tetra genes somehow work their way in when they're mixed in aquaria. Like, there's some freaky emperor tetra who's just really self-conscious and only mates with the blind.
Joking aside, I wonder if there's been much/any evidence of species reversing their vestigialities.
We can't undo what nature has done over millions of years in 10 years of captive breeding.
I meant they are brought up to the lighted world that they are not really living in the darkness anymore.