Help ID this pike

kno4te

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Looks like Sp vennie as strigata havent been brought in for a while. Ban on import I believe from what others like Rocksor Rocksor have mentioned. See what mrrobxc mrrobxc says as well.
 

fishhead0103666

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Magnus_Bane

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Crenicichla sp. "Venezuela" a.k.a. Venezuelan pike cichlid. I used to have one of these guys a couple years back. Very fun fish just don't feed it live food or it will take you a couple months to get it onto artificial.
 

Rocksor

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Strigata is from eastern brazil, and you won't see it imported on purpose. As an adult it will have an orange lined humeral spot. There's a few pictures on this site, just do a search for strigata.

A huge batch like that is more likely sp Venezuela. I've seen 2 variants, one that stays grey all their life and the other has yellow in the underside of the body and cheeks with the females also having pink in the belly along with the yellow.
 

Goggy

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A huge batch like that is more likely sp Venezuela. I've seen 2 variants, one that stays grey all their life and the other has yellow in the underside of the body and cheeks with the females also having pink in the belly along with the yellow.
So I thought pikes at this size couldn’t be ID’d as they are too similar in striping as juveniles.

I understand that adult strigata have a orangish/yellowish fade on their body so I thought that the completely yellow bodies on these fish deserved a second look.

This is a wild fish LFS and gets their shipments from places like Taiwan and Singapore. Singapore’s jzx received two shipments of Crenicichla sp. Xingu 1 in the last three months which I believe is banned from export, so maybe something like a strigata is possible.

Is there anything specific to look for in sp. Venezuelas?

These combined reasons are why I believe these fish deserved a second look
 

Rocksor

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So I thought pikes at this size couldn’t be ID’d as they are too similar in striping as juveniles.

I understand that adult strigata have a orangish/yellowish fade on their body so I thought that the completely yellow bodies on these fish deserved a second look.

This is a wild fish LFS and gets their shipments from places like Taiwan and Singapore. Singapore’s jzx received two shipments of Crenicichla sp. Xingu 1 in the last three months which I believe is banned from export, so maybe something like a strigata is possible.
I still highly doubt it's strigata based on the look. Those juveniles share the same characteristic as juvenile vennies that have been imported for so long. I've seen them called black line striped pike, and they still grew up as vennies. I haven't seen proof that juveniles that look like those in the pic grow up to be strigata. I've only seen 1 picture of what is reported to be juvenile strigata, and it had a faint gold humeral spot. Not all juveniles or sub-adults of the lugubris group look the same.

Tawain and Singapore could have cracked the code in breeding Xingu 1. All it takes is a few couples from a shipment.
 
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Goggy

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I still highly doubt it's strigata based on the look. Those juveniles share the same characteristic as juvenile vennies that have been imported for so long. I've seen them called black line striped pike, and they still grew up as vennies. I haven't seen proof that juveniles that look like those in the pic grow up to be strigata. I've only seen 1 picture of what is reported to be juvenile strigata, and it had a faint gold humeral spot. Not all juveniles or sub-adults of the lugubris group look the same.

Tawain and Singapore could have cracked the code in breeding Xingu 1. All it takes is a few couples from a shipment.
Thanks, that was a very clear explanation.

That would explain why most of the Xingu 1s at jzx were juvenile:
78F42071-6C07-4713-88F9-2E928A41D1BF.jpeg

But what about these guys:
83902E20-1B8B-421F-ABE1-30F6478E265B.jpeg

These were the adults at the store and is this a Xingu 1? I am more familiar with the green/pink/green variant but have seen images of these guys in the internet before.

Is it possible to collect Xingu 1s from the wild? I believe it is only the Xingu River where pikes are prohibited? Is it unheard of for them to appear outside their range?
 

Rocksor

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That could have been an illegal shipment (missed by Brazilian authorities) or maybe the pikes moved to a different location where collection is legal as a result of the dams setup on the Xingu, leading to re-routing of parts of the Xingu river.
 
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