To those of you who keep them, do they ever color up nice in the tank? I had two and they never really took on the same colors I see in the wild. I caught a few today that were stunning, but I never saw that in my tank. What conditions make those colors come out??
Red breasted sunfish ?s
- Thread starter mikeb210
- Start date
Yes. They color up just fine in tanks. Are you sure you had males? Females will remain a bitter duller than the males. They can look really similar in some cases. Most males (wild and in captivity) color up at a very young age. As soon as they get about 2.5 inches, you can start to distinguish the two. Mine stayed colored up year round. He got a bit more colored up when the apartment warmed a bit and there was more natural sunlight in the room. However, he was always red on the breast with nice spots, and had a blue sheen on his sides in certain light.
Thanks for the response. I'm not sure about the sex of mine. As soon as they get attachments working again I'll post a picture of them. They were around 4" though, so they might just have been females. The ones I caught today were blue sides, blood red chest and tail and fluorescent blue around the face and dorsal.
Is yours wild caught or did you buy him from a distributor? What temperature works best in your opinion?
Is yours wild caught or did you buy him from a distributor? What temperature works best in your opinion?
When you post a pic we can help with sexing it. Mine was wild caught @ 2.5''. Honestly, I keep all my tanks at room temp, but when i do water changes I add the coldest water that comes out of the faucet. In winter, he still had color when the temp was around 65F, in the spring the tank temp went up to about 73F. Right at the 70F mark is when he started building a nest, defending territory and became brilliant in color. Hope that helps. Oh, and they all ate Hikari Cichlid Gold pellets.
I have had mixed outcomes with training. My first one (my avatar) was very hard to train. It took nearly 2 months - and it was quite annoying. Luckily, at the time, I had the time for this. I began by feeding frozen bloodworms. Once he accepted those, I mixed bloodworms and baby pellets by creating a clump of soggy pellets and worms. He eventually took this. Then, I started putting pellets into the cup I was thawing bloodworms in. This let the pellets soak up the bloody water. Eventually, he just started taking regular pellets.
My others were much easier. They were starved for about a week after 2 weeks on frozen bloodworms and they immediately ate plain pellets. After that, fish (redbreasts and greens) got easier b/c they learned from the other sunnies in the tank that pellets=food. It certainly helps to have other trained fish in the tank. Don't be afraid of making them fast for a while.
Sorry for a long post..
Your fish looks like it could be female. The earflap doesn't look elongate enough. However, it is tough to tell. The black tank (which I like) may be causing it to darken up a bit. But still looks female as the colors are just not intense. She is staying a rather 'yellow' color (typical of females) as opposed to the intense red and blue sheen on the sides that males have.
I think Brian Zimmerman has a pic of a male and female next to each other on his new website.
ZimmermansFish.com
My others were much easier. They were starved for about a week after 2 weeks on frozen bloodworms and they immediately ate plain pellets. After that, fish (redbreasts and greens) got easier b/c they learned from the other sunnies in the tank that pellets=food. It certainly helps to have other trained fish in the tank. Don't be afraid of making them fast for a while.
Sorry for a long post..
Your fish looks like it could be female. The earflap doesn't look elongate enough. However, it is tough to tell. The black tank (which I like) may be causing it to darken up a bit. But still looks female as the colors are just not intense. She is staying a rather 'yellow' color (typical of females) as opposed to the intense red and blue sheen on the sides that males have.
I think Brian Zimmerman has a pic of a male and female next to each other on his new website.
ZimmermansFish.com
Just as a side note, I have raised my water temp to 76-80 range which is a bit steep in my opinion but I noticed a vivid change in color on the males. You may try raising the temp a bit see how it works. I can say for the first couple of weeks while the fish ARE GETTING aclimated they tend to be a little duller. My bluegill for instance will change colors based on his mood.
One other note I went from live minnows to shrimp pellets in a matter of days not sure if it was my particular situation or the fish just were that hungry, but it worked.