Black Widow Tetra

[Samage]

Perusing one of my local LFSs today, looking to purchase a Black Widow Tetra, to go with my recently-bereaved BWT (Hey, it really is a Widow Tetra now!)

I peered into the BWT tank, and saw...well, surprise surpise, lots of BWTs. One in particular stood out - it had much larger fins then the others, and a wavy, almost Guppy-like tail. No others had these.

Is this normal, or some kind of mutation? And should I grab this fish whilst I still can?

 

[heresmike]

Don't know if this is normal or not, but if the fish appealed to you, I would say grab it!

 

[finius]

It's a variation. Pretty common actually.

 

[Samage]

Ah, I see. It's just I'd never seen one like that before, and was odd how no others in the tank had it. Musta been a mix-up at the stockists, maybe a finned one got in with the not-finned ones.

I might buy it anyway, quite attractive. And it means I'd be able to tell my BWTs apart...

 

[pendragon]

Yup. Black widow tetras (aka Black skirt tetras) come in two varieties: standard and long-finned (I've also seen the long-finned ones called long-skirt or high-skirt). All the LFSs near me keep a sizable stock of each.

pendragon!

 

[Opcn]

Man for those of us cixelsids out there BWT looks an awful lot like By The Way

Opcn

 

[Paradise_Gourami]

Yeah its normat there is a long finned version

 

[heresmike]

Man for those of us cixelsids out there BWT looks an awful lot like By The Way

Opcn