Does anyone keep the wild varieties of livebearers? It seems like it is only cultivated fish in discussion.
What happened to the xiphophorus clemenciae, cortezi, signum and montezumae instead of the colour strains of helleri?
Then there are all the other types of livebearers like scolichthys greenwayi, poecilia chica, gambusia holbrooki etc etc.
These fish and many more are very nice fish. It is just a shame we limit ourselves to so few.
I suppose there of lots of people who have never heard of these fish?
Over the years of fish keeping I have had the pleasure of keeping some of these and believe me they are worth tracking down.

I have some swordtails. I think they are the ones u r talking about. I had 1 of the ones that looked exactly the same as xiphophorus clemenciae but it got stuck under a rock and died.

I am new to FF but I do keep 3 different strains of montezuma sword- mottled ivory, blue/green and Rascon. All are purebred from wild caughts and all were obtained from the same source.

The ivories breed like mad. The blue/green are notorious fry eaters and will stop breeding at times. the Rascons were acquired as young juvies about 3 months ago and have been growing out. Of the original 7, I have four left- just lost the first one to show a tail stub this past week.

I was drawn to swords when I set up my first tank. After learning about being overrun by fry and trading out my common ones, I discovered Xiph. Center and fell in love with montys. It took me a long time to find them, but I am glad I did.

i have never seen any pure bred fish (i THink )

I have some mosquito fish (gambusia holbrooki) that I found in a shipment of feeder fish at my LFS. They took a little while to get used to dry food but they seem to be doing ok. The fry are hard to keep because the parents will hunt down all the fry no matter the size of the tank they are being kept in. I had to separate the female in a net that the fry could fall through just to have some babies survive!

I am glad people have some of the unusuals.

TwoTankAmin
I have not had any of the montezuma swords although I have seen them on the show bench on my travels. The males can get some long swords on them.
The only swords I have currently are the xiph. signum variety. Just my luck to only have males.
I hope to get some females at a fish auction this year (fingers crossed).
Have you ever had/seen any of the cortezi swords. I used to breed these for a while.

guppymonkey
I have had some of the Gambusia Holbrooki in the past. I do like these fish but you do not see them all that often around the fish shops. I have seen two varieties of these. I have reared young off these, mostly of which turned out to be female.

Does your LFS sell fish to feed to other fish? If so what other species do they use?

One type of fish I would like to get my hands on is scolichthys greenwayi. The last one I had was about 15 years ago. It was in a tank with some heterandria formosa. I never did get any young off it. It was a great show fish.

I have Metallic Live-bearer (Girardinus metallicus).

I hoping for some more fry soon.

Funnily enough I have had them too in the past.

The males are

Not sure if they count as 'wild' anymore, but I have Heterandria Formosa. I've been trying to get hold of Limia Vittata for months, but nobody in Britain seems to have them.

I think there's still a bit of a tendency for some experienced fishkeepers to sneer at Livebearers (I know that wouldn't happen on here!) as if they somehow are less valid or worthwhile than other fish - certainly the lesser known livebearers are a lot harder to get hold of from shops (in my area, at least) than most other fish.

I have wild guppies and mosquito fish!

I wanted to get a colony of montys a couple of months ago but my LFS got in some of the red eye red hi fin lyretails and I couldn't resist them. The montys will have to wait until I get another tank. The wild varieties of swords are pretty awesome but I'd want to keep them in their own tank to avoid crossing with my common colored guys. I've also got a marigold wag hi fin male and a pineapple hi fin male and 5 of the red hi fin lyretail females. Not wilds but pretty neat looking!

I thought you had posted a picture of a headstander for a minute.

I too avoid mixing varieties to prevent contamination.

I too have some cultivated fish, I just prefer the natural fish.

I managed to get myself a pair of Belonesox Belizanus (pike livebearer) two weeks ago.
I was gutted when the male was found dead the other day.
I will have to try to get another one.

Alot of local fish shops only stock the usual guppies, platies, swordtails and mollies.
I visited Maidenhead at Harleston Heath to get the pikes, they have extended the ammount of tanks they have and will have a livebearer section soon. Lets hope they will continue to stock some of the more unusual ones.

Just my champion bubble bouncer!

Here's my list in the signature - so much more than guppies!

Yep the montezumae have the loooooong tails:

I have a 10-Gallon tank with 5 Mosquito fish I caught near my house and they are great! I introduced 3 female feeder Guppies and they were getting along for a while but some of the Mosquito females tend to nip them. I also added 2 fancy female guppies and the Mosquito's actually killed one of the Fancy Females! Mosquito's are definately more aggressive.

It's true! The mosquito fish are vicious little brats! My female mosquito fish is the boss of the tank--strangely enough--and all of the other fish, including the male guppies, get chased off and nipped when they enter her "personal space". My wild guppies are starting to reproduce like crazy... but I really don't want to sell them to the LFS as "feeder fish". Hmmm... guess I'll just have to buy another tank. *sigh* I'm actually mixing them with a gorgeous yellow fancy, so I'll have to see how that little experiment turns out. I'm hoping to get beautiful, yet hardy guppies.

Oooooh! Nice tail TwoTankAmin! I have got to get some of those, I just love those incredibly long tails. I love their coloration too, simple yet so striking.

TwoTankAmin - your picture is of one of the ivory mottled Montys? Do you have any pictures of the blue/green and Rascons that you could share with us?