Rare fish theory

[fugupuff]

you've hit many points. and wow, you were selling them for $85.00 each, I remember retailing them for $40.00 back in the days! Those days are long over!

there are some rare fish though, that you'll only see once in a while, and remain in small numbers!

I think these are just hand picked Indo's and not true Saimese Widebars. Here's a few real Widebars I sold back in 2006 that is what I consider to be True Widebars. I picked up over a few dozen of these guys when they came in.

http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=33938

Now, are one recently for sale any less quality than a true Widebar? hell no, these Indo's are just as nice. I've had great Indo's in the past that was stable and as beautiful as a true Widebar.

For these new batches to fetch this kind of money is just fish raping at it's best..... talk about NO VASELINE.

However, people can always ask their price, It's the buyer that dictates the cost of the fish. If people buy, why would the price be any less. It comes down to self preference. If people can afford it, then hey buy it. In my own honest opininion these fish should fetch no more than $50-75 a piece at their size in today's market.

Rare fish will always come in waves. It's a rarity one minute, then 1000's show up the following week and then no one wants it anymore.

If someone wants it bad enough they will pay. I even enteratined the thought of buying one @ $250 or so. Then I woke up and realized my arse would have hurt the next day.

 

[dogofwar]

Buyers in the fish hobby are fickle, fad-driven and cyclical. People want to be the only one with a rare fish. So someone like you go and get it for them. And most of them don't want to pay for your effort...or want something slightly different (but didn't bother to tell you). But a few people do shell out the cash and get them...and maybe post some pictures of them...and maybe breed them...and more people get them.

And before you know it, the fish in question no longer seems super rare...and people want the next thing. And dump the fish in question for pennies on the dollar. Or take poor care of it and it dies. And the cycle repeats itself.

As a hobbyist I keep and breed what I like, rare or otherwise.

Matt

 

[R1_Ridah]

there are some rare fish though, that you'll only see once in a while, and remain in small numbers!

I agree, but what do you consider small numbers? Small population in the wild or small numbers as to what's been imported?

 

[fugupuff]

I agree, but what do you consider small numbers? Small population in the wild or small numbers as to what's been imported?

Gold korean perch, only imported once in the US., and not found in the hobby anywhere else

leptobotia elongata, small numbers remaining in the wild, and non in captivity

xingu peacock bass, cichla maleniae, due to ban from collection and export, small numbers in US captivity

protomyzon pachychilus, small loaches only found in a few small streams in southern China, there are really no commercial collection or exports

your platinum silver aro before, rare mutations, rare in wild and captivity.

so these are a few examples of what remains to be rare in the hobby in the US and I'm sure I can add some more to the list

 

[jcardona1]

and now here comes the so called cambodian, vietnam, whatever, they often have split bars on one side or another, typically will have 7 bars, since the tail bar does not usually connect, or 8 if the split on one side is complete. they're the closest to a wide bar, some look almost identical. but their colors usually have a gray overtone, some will stay nice and yellow, but most are not stable. I have experience with selling this fish and keeping them as well. here are some examles, and I belive this is the fish we have on hand now that we're dealing with. I'm not calling it a different species, but it could be, or at least a geographical variation of datnoid pulcher. they look almost just like a chaopraya, but the tail is different and color stability is usually not there.

some may remember the one in the first picture, was from my shop, it was always black, so this guy jarret talked me into selling it, then he moved it, and it turned bright! this and look at the tail band!

nice post. this goes along with the thread that was deleted a few weeks back from a vendor on another site bring these in. in the end it fell through but i believe they really were Pulcher.

what bothers me though is that people say that Chao pulcher is the "true widebar" or "true ST". and for this same reason is why i hate common names. arent both of these still classified to this day as d. Pulcher? i dont see how one is the real-deal and one is not. sure, the pulcher from thailand may have some traits that are more desirable than those of cambodia/vietnam, but it's still the same species, am i right?

with the possible extinction of the Chao Phraya pulcher it will be pretty hard to come up with new evidence that would labels these fish as two different species.

and what makes this even more difficult is the public's opinion on what a 'widebar' really is. everybody has an image in their mind that a widebar/ST should look like the thailand Pulcher. and many would be quick to dismiss the Cambodian pulcher as just a 'nice 3-bar indo', and this isnt correct IMO. they are both Pulcher, and they are both 'widebars'. i think it's just a geographic variant like you say.

just like when you brought in the rio negro orinos. nobody stood up and said they were a different species of orino, even though they look different than the orinoco orinos with the diamond-shaped patterns. it's no different with these Pulchers

 

[fugupuff]

a few more

Gold korean perch, only imported once in the US., and not found in the hobby anywhere else

leptobotia elongata, small numbers remaining in the wild, and non in captivity

xingu peacock bass, cichla maleniae, due to ban from collection and export, small numbers in US captivity

protomyzon pachychilus, small loaches only found in a few small streams in southern China, there are really no commercial collection or exports

true tor putitora, is rare in the wild, protected, and banned from export., only small numbers are bought from farms to be exported.

ture bagarius yarelli, rarely caught in any numbers

tetradon pustulatus, found in smaller areas around Cameroon, only a few in the hobby, period.

Lates japonicus, only exported from Japan, which is actually illegal.

your platinum silver aro before, rare mutations, rare in wild and captivity.

but what people think are rare, are actually not that rare, like asian arowana, there are millions being bred yearly at this time.

true datnoid pulcher seems to be rare now days

channa barca, only a few are caught each year <---drool!!
so these are a few examples of what remains to be rare in the hobby in the US and I'm sure I can add some more to the list

 

[jcardona1]

your platinum silver aro before, rare mutations, rare in wild and captivity.

Wes what do you know about these platinum variations? seems like lately there's platinum-everything coming from Asia. this is just speculation, but i have a feeling they have labs over there doing some genetic manipulation to develop all these platinum fish. then they ship them over here where people pay thousands of dollars for a man-made fish thinking they have some super rare naturally occuring mutation. anywho, thats just my wild guesstimations

 

[fugupuff]

certainly agree with you that we cannot determine if the cambodian/vietnamese datnoids are a seperate/different species than tha chao praya ones.

However, the charo praya ones always only have 6 seperate bars, while these, the most recent ones posted by ecz have 7 seperate bars, and also the ones they're selling in Japan. So in this case, like the rio negro orino, its not so much true or not true, but a specific quality or trait people are looking for. And of course people always want the "rarest" one, if rio negro were brought in by the thousands, they would be the same as the rio meta ones

nice post. this goes along with the thread that was deleted a few weeks back from a vendor on another site bring these in. in the end it fell through but i believe they really were Pulcher.

what bothers me though is that people say that Chao pulcher is the "true widebar" or "true ST". and for this same reason is why i hate common names. arent both of these still classified to this day as d. Pulcher? i dont see how one is the real-deal and one is not. sure, the pulcher from thailand may have some traits that are more desirable than those of cambodia/vietnam, but it's still the same species, am i right?

with the possible extinction of the Chao Phraya pulcher it will be pretty hard to come up with new evidence that would labels these fish as two different species.

and what makes this even more difficult is the public's opinion on what a 'widebar' really is. everybody has an image in their mind that a widebar/ST should look like the thailand Pulcher. and many would be quick to dismiss the Cambodian pulcher as just a 'nice 3-bar indo', and this isnt correct IMO. they are both Pulcher, and they are both 'widebars'. i think it's just a geographic variant like you say.

just like when you brought in the rio negro orinos. nobody stood up and said they were a different species of orino, even though they look different than the orinoco orinos with the diamond-shaped patterns. it's no different with these Pulchers

 

[fugupuff]

Wes what do you know about these platinum variations? seems like lately there's platinum-everything coming from Asia. this is just speculation, but i have a feeling they have labs over there doing some genetic manipulation to develop all these platinum fish. then they ship them over here where people pay thousands of dollars for a man-made fish thinking they have some super rare naturally occuring mutation. anywho, thats just my wild guesstimations

the platinums stuff, I know they offer them to me from the wild, platinum silvers from Peru., and albino animals from Africa, or India. These are genetic mutations that occur in the wild.

Of course through selective breeding, they can produce dominant expressed mutation aritficially, such as the platinum gar, platinum bichirs that are produced in Thailand.

In humans, there are albinos, and other pigment disorders like vitiligo that occur, we just tend not to breed them together for a specific trait. Usually chinese and chinese produce off springs that look like chinese, and black people are the same way.

 

[Bsixxx]

Bring in more perch!
And unfortunatly my elopyctis died, choked on a guppy that was a little too large