BC's Fish Length Log

bernie comeau · Mar 28, 2008

The purpose of this thread is too document the length of most of my fish and then in about a years time and every year after, measure again and see how the fish change. My photography skills really suck, and some of the pictures are on an angle which makes it look like I can't read a tape measure :lol: Some of the pictures make it look like I'm out by at least 1/4 -3/4". However the measuremnt itself was taken before the photograph with the tape measure directly on the fish, usually with the metal end flush with the mouth. Most are accurate to an 1/8" of an inch (exception being the plecs and RBP). This is not something one would want to do too often to fish as it is a little rough on them; they do lose some slime coat. Particularily my RBP look a little rough today :lol: , but there O.K.

Here are the fish and the measurements taken, march 27, 2008.

Male dovii, 13". Has a forked tail :lol: as he's currently missing a big chunk in the middle of his tail fin, courtesy of the RBP. He was purchased in april, 2006.

"older" pleco. 13". Purchased 2005.

Female Red Terror. 9 1/4". Purchased dec., 2004.

bernie comeau · Mar 28, 2008

Red Bellied Piranahs

RBP #1) 9 1/4".

RBP #2) 9 1/8"

RBP#3) 8 3/4"

RBP #4) "Bone Head" 8 1/2"

RBP #4, Bone Head, is the thickest but is now the 2nd smallest, as he is the shortest and is not as deep bodied as the two largest. I purchased him october, 2005, at 6-7". The other 3 were purchase july, 2006, at 1-2".

Mudfrog · Mar 28, 2008

Nice fish and a great idea.. Your Dovii grew to 13" in a year? how big when you purchased him? Mines slow lol

bernie comeau · Mar 28, 2008

Tilapia zilli. 13 3/4". By far, my largest and heaviest fish. Not really a very good picture to show its length, but you can see the upside down 14" mark beside my thumb, to give some idea of its length. Purchased april, 2005.

"Newest" pleco. 11". Traded 3 young BBs for it at the LFS, oct., 2007.

Male BB. 9 7/8". Purchsed oct. 2006. aprox. 1 1/2 year old.

Female BB. 7 1/2". Just recently gave away the larger female, to an LFS, as it was getting picked on by the male BB. He seems to like the smaller, more colorfull one, a lot more. Some times, when the Tilapia is busy eating, they gang up on my male sal, but the BB's actually do worse against the sal, as a team :lol:

Male Salvini. 7 5/8". Born nov., 2005.

"Walmart" male sal. 4 1/8". purchased earlt feb., 2008.

bernie comeau · Mar 28, 2008

Mudfrog said:
Nice fish and a great idea.. Your Dovii grew to 13" in a year? how big when you purchased him? Mines slow lol

It will be 2 yrs I have had him, this april. He was around 5" when I purchased him. He had been returned to the LFS, as he had wiped out a tank, killing all his tankmates ( no idea, though, what he had been kept with or the size of tank). Grew very fast when I got him in the first few months; maybe he was older then I think and was making up for lost time. And yes, he grew to his present length, pretty much, with in a year of getting him, but has definately put some size and weight on, in the last year. Though my Tilapia has definately put more size and weight on, over the last year, then he has.

Female RT, was ~1/2" -1" when I bought her, over 3 years ago.

bernie comeau · Mar 28, 2008

Male dovii X Red terror hybrid. 7" . 10 months old, born 1st week of june, 2007.

One of two female dovii X Red terror hybrid. (I hope there females!) 6". 10 months old. I know the picture is blurry, but for the purposes of this thread, it's actually one of the best pictures as it shows accurately, the length of the fish, as well as shows how most of these fishes were actually measured.

bernie comeau · Mar 28, 2008

Belly crawler pike cichlid. 7 3/4". Purchased april, easter monday, 2007, at ~ 1-2". With out actually measuring him, I would have thought he was over 8" as looks a lot longer then my salvini or female BB.

Striped male convict. 5 3/4". ~1 1/2 yrs. old. Born early oct., 2006.

"Golden" male convict. 5 3/4". ~1 1/2 yrs. old. Born early sept., 2006. Terrible picture! :lol: Exact same length as striped male con but not as deep bodied, but a lot thicker. Who's heavier between the two male cons, I dunno?

I really expected these young male cons to measure, at the very most, 5 1/4", but they were measured repeatedly, and I always got the same measurement.

bernie comeau · Mar 28, 2008

Female Cons.

#1)"petsmart" female con. 4 1/8". Purchased july 2006. Wife of striped male.

#2) Female con. 3 7/8". born oct. 2006. 1 1/2 yrs. old. Brother of striped male; wife of golden male.

#3) One of two young female cons. 3 3/4". Born may, 2007. 11 months old. Daughters of Golden male and female con #2.

The 2 young females are deeper bodied but lighter then the two older females. suprising there is only 3/8" difference between my female cons as the petsmart female (#1) has a more elongated body shape, but is older and heavier then the other 3.

bernie comeau · Mar 28, 2008

Africans

Male jewel. 3 7/8". Purchased dec., 2007.

Female jewel. 3 5/8". Purchased may, 2007. A little older, heavier, but shorter then the male.

Male auratus. 5". Purchased may, 2007 at 1-2". Nasty auratus, making a total liar out of me :lol: I claimed he was 6" in another thread, but I figured he was 6" because he looked longer then my male cons, though I never have seen them side by side. I also claimed in that same thread that my mbuna never get heavy in the breast, nor large bellies. I swear to god the picture is exaggerating, because he doesn't look at all like that inside the tank :lol:

Male kenyi. 3 3/4". purchased, early feb., 2008. Would have never thought my young 'walmart' sal would actually be longer, with out actually measuring the fish!

Frameshift · Mar 28, 2008

Dovii festae cross? Crazy. First CA X SA hybrid I've seen.

chc · Mar 29, 2008

That female RT is AWESOME!

Big Vine · Mar 29, 2008

Nice work, Bernie.
Thank you for taking the time and effort to do this. :thumb:

BV

thetim6 · Mar 29, 2008

Cool idea bernie, something I've always wanted to do but never have done. Your fish look great, I especially like the festae and dovii.

I got inspired by your thread and decided to document the length of my cichlids.

I started a Central American thread, but I only keep 3 centrals right now. (I know, blaspheme! lol)

I'm going to start a thread in the Tanganyikan forum as well, so check them both out if your interested.

Btw, are those hybrids really that black color or is it just the picture?

trimac · Mar 29, 2008

nice fish!!

bernie comeau · Mar 29, 2008

thetim6 said:
Cool idea bernie, something I've always wanted to do but never have done. Your fish look great, I especially like the festae and dovii.

I got inspired by your thread and decided to document the length of my cichlids.

I started a Central American thread, but I only keep 3 centrals right now. (I know, blaspheme! lol)

I'm going to start a thread in the Tanganyikan forum as well, so check them both out if your interested.

Btw, are those hybrids really that black color or is it just the picture?

I caught these fish while doing a water change and removed decor. Once you stick a net in the tank, most of the fish are in scared mode and have turned a dull or pale brown color. Once you catch them, and take them out of the water, many of the cichlids will turn black in color very quickly. So no, the dovii X RT hybrids are only black, because of the state they are in -------- just like the sals, cons and jewels ect. (The only fishes that I have ever seen go completely black in the aquarium sometimes, are convicts, but it usually signifies a completely different state then they are in, in these pictures.)

The hybrids aren't really too colorfull yet. They are brownish, but if looked at closely, you can see a lot of color underneath that brown. The male has more green on his face and all of them have dots on their body, but the dots are not black like a dovii, they are red. When they threaten each other, their body turns yellow and a horizontal as well as vertical stripes becomes more prominant. All of them have a red trim on their dorsal, though neither of their parents do

Although they have traits of both, so far they resemble a red terror a little more.

I find measuring fish usefull for many reasons. I started measuring fish ~10 years ago, but in the past, usually only after a fish dies. I think what a lot of people will find is that some of their larger fish are not as long as they would have thought, and some of their smaller fish are actually longer then they think. And length is often not really a very good measure of the size of the fish; weight would actually be a better indication; Actually both would be a better indication yet, but I don't have a scale.

Next time I do this (in a yr. or so), I'm going to use a ruler for fish under 12" and place the ruler directly under the fish, for photographs. For larger fish, the tape directly on top of the fish for the picture. For taking a measurement, a tape works good, but for someone with my kind of photography skills :lol: , I think a ruler for pictures would work much better. No big deal in the sense that for my purposes the actual measurement is most important, but I am not at all happy with most of my pictures. All one can really deduce from some of my pictures is a general size range. For example it is clear from the pictures that my RBP are over 8" , but that 2 are actually over 9" has not been shown at all from the pictures, etc.

thetim6 · Mar 30, 2008

I did notice color changing on most of my fish, especially on my male convict and old red devil. The convict turned almost all black and the red devil went PALE white! Kind of funny actually, I think she was scared.

I think my RD is kind of fat too! All of my other fish were very firm, but she was extremely soft and her scales would come up if pressed down (hard to describe). I was really surprised at how soft the hump is on top of the head too.

Funnily enough, I found my smaller fish much bigger than I thought (six inch jewel cichlid I thought was 4 1/2) and my red devil was only ~10 inches or so and I thought she was 12 inches (with the tail)!

Here's a link to my thread for reference:
http://www.cichlidforum.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=168390&sid=e696284440220d8fdf203de2d7703bae

bernie comeau · Nov 3, 2009

I'm going to add a code to each fish. As I do have a few of some kind, especially cons, sals and BB which I currently breed, it might become confusing as to which fish is which. The first fish I am going to show are from page one , the rest are new since the last measurements ( or in case of my male jewel, not measured the last time as I didn't include my youngest fish). Fish measured, nov.1, 2009:

D.1 Male dovii measured at 15"

http://i192.photobucket.com/albums/z116/Bern-C/1a1b.jpg

http://i192.photobucket.com/albums/z116/Bern-C/1a1c.jpg

RBP.1 Red bellied Piranah. Measured at 9 1/2"

http://i192.photobucket.com/albums/z116/Bern-C/1a2.jpg

RBP.2 red bellied piranah. measured at 9 3/4"

http://i192.photobucket.com/albums/z116/Bern-C/1ab.jpg

Pl.1 Plecostomus. measured at 13 1/4"

http://i192.photobucket.com/albums/z116/Bern-C/1ac2.jpg

bernie comeau · Nov 3, 2009

bernie comeau · Nov 3, 2009

bernie comeau · Dec 29, 2009

Sal.1 Female salvini born jan., 2009. Product of larger male sal pictured on page one (my line of salvinis) bred with walmart female sal. Measured at 3 5/8", on nov. 21, 2009. Close to 11 months old at time of picture
http://i192.photobucket.com/albums/z116/Bern-C/1a2d.jpg

http://i192.photobucket.com/albums/...art male. Measured at 1 1/2", nov. 21, 2009 http://i192.photobucket.com/albums/z116/Bern-C/1a2f.jpg http://i192.photobucket.com/albums/z116/Bern-C/1a2e.jpg Sal.3 male salvini also from the ...red at 1 1/2",but a smaller fish then Sal.2 http://i192.photobucket.com/albums/z116/Bern-C/1a2g.jpg

3 smaller salvinis , Sal.4, Sal.5, Sal.6 also from the same march batch, were not measured but I beleive them to be less then 1 1/2" as they are quite a bit smaller then Sal.2 and Sal.3 . I also beleive all 3 to be females but am not absolutely sure yet.

BC's Fish Length Log

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