how to make frontosa group

[mike dunagan]

it does not think it, it just grows faster...I believe genetically determined...

 

[KABB44423]

how does an alpha male grow faster than the dominant male. can any fish become an alpha male? doesnt make sense to me. seems crazy to me because a fish thinks "oh im vice president im gotta grow faster than the president"

it just happens like that its in there blue jeans

 

[mike dunagan]

it just happens like that its in there blue jeans

today is a sad day...

 

[popcorn1]

i was just told that the alpha male is another name for dominant male. is this info wrong?

 

[mike dunagan]

yes, alpha is greek for first... so dominant...

 

[popcorn1]

is it just me or did my frontosa gain half an inch after i added 4 other smaller ones. im not even joking. i got the four like 2 weeks ago.

 

[Pharaoh]

Heck of a growth spurt I'd say. Always seems like that to me. I look at them one day and the fish is 1.5". I walk by the next day and the same fish is at 2". Wierd how it works.

 

[crashinc25]

is it just me or did my frontosa gain half an inch after i added 4 other smaller ones. im not even joking. i got the four like 2 weeks ago.

I would say it's something only YOU are seeing, but I added 8 1 1/2" Burundi Fronts to a juvie colony of 7 and noticed the 2 biggest males got a little darker, a little bigger, and gained some good hump size, all in like 3 weeks.

 

[kay-bee]

how does an alpha male grow faster than the dominant male.

it does not think it, it just grows faster...I believe genetically determined...

It's based on hormones more than genetics. If growing out a group of identically sized fry, the dominant(s) will grow considerably faster than its/their peers (example, after some time, most of the fish will all be the same size except for one or maybe two which are considerably larger, ~1.5-2x than the rest, and clearly dominant). Remove these dominants, and they will be replaced by others who undergo a hormone-charged growth spurt (meaning of the remaining identically sized juvies, one or two will undergo a dominance-related growth spurt). However if the original dominants are kept in the tank, the subsequent growth spurts of the other(s) doesn't happen.

Alpha male=dominant male.

In a tank containing several species, you can have alpha males of each species in the tank (which in turn have their own pecking order, but there's usually one overall tank dominant).

can any fish become an alpha male? doesnt make sense to me. seems crazy to me because a fish thinks "oh im vice president im gotta grow faster than the president"

Any fish "can" become the alpha (in some cases it's not necessarily a male), however accomplishing that depends on certain factors. Being hierarchal fish, there is typically one overall dominant. Another fish can become the dominant if one of two things occurs:

a) the dominant is removed from the tank by the owner, or
b)the dominant is defeated or killed by rival (typically the beta-male, the 2nd most dominant fish in the tank).

The latter can occur at any time after sexual maturity is attained, usually when the sub-dominant males attain the same size as the alpha male. Interestingly, a defeated alpha male can fall way down in the tank's pecking order (i.e., goes from being #1 to #4 or even lower). A successful dominant alpha male, however, can retain its top position for quite some time.

 

[mike dunagan]

would it be in fact genetic if it is hormones not introduced by anyone else, but created with in the fish?