Jack Dempsey? or "Blue Texas" Carpintis?

[kmschultz]

I saw these beautiful blue spotted juveniles that Petco identified as Jack Dempseys. I got three and am now thinking that they aren't actually JD's but Carpintis. There are 2 with black stripes and one without. They've all doubled in size since Jan 30 and I think I'm going to have some monsters on my hands.

 

[duanes]

They look like carpintus (or carpintus hybrids) to me.
Here are a couple true carpintus.

male above10-12", female below 6" (both in spawning dress)

Below a half grown male in normal coloration.

 

[MatteoTheEnder22]

Nice fish either way

 

[kmschultz]

I suspect if I want to keep them they're going to need their own 90+gal by next year though.

 

[MatteoTheEnder22]

Most probably or bigger even

 

[kmschultz]

They look like carpintus (or carpintus hybrids) to me.
Here are a couple true carpintus.

male above10-12", female below 6" (both in spawning dress)

Below a half grown male in normal coloration.

That bottom one especially looks like a grown-up version of the non-striped one. Those are gorgeous fish. Looks like I'll be paying closer attention to my Craigslist notifications for a tank upgrade.

 

[duanes]

My experience with adults is you can keep a compatible pair in a tank of of about 6 ft long, but with no other cichlids, or any other fish that resembles a cichlid. In a smaller tank only one individual would be best. The females that remain smaller are at most risk from males in small tanks.
They tend to ignore other fish that don't pose a territorial chanllage, as long as those fish don't fit in their mouth.

 

[Magnus_Bane]

The top fish in the pic is actually a FH. I'd agree with everyone else saying the bottom on is either a Texas or carpinitus but the top one is most definitely a flowerhorn. If ya look closely at it you can still see a very faint outline of the flower spot line it's got. Still a pretty good find if ya got it for the price of a Jack Dempsey.

 

[kmschultz]

I paid a total of $14.78 for the 3 of them. Even got a discount because one of them looked a little chewed up and I was going to have them swap it out, but changed my mind figuring it would do better with me than going back into the LFS cesspool.

 

[Jacob92677]

I’d say top is a Fh also