Yellow Lab

[didz04]

hi there my yellow lab has started to go black from the bottom half, its happened before but then gone back to normall, any ideas what it could be???
Could it be a sign of my water quality not been right, i do regular water changes every week and my PH is 7.4
He seems to be eating normal and still as activate as usual.

any help will be great thanks

 

[kribensis12]

Is it a male? I believe it's a breeding sign. My male gets a "beard" on him, where an inch from his mouth is black, like aftershave.

 

[dthoffsett]

Could be a breeding sign, is it black in spots or all over? They'll sometimes get black spots/splotches if they are feed too much spirulina. What color is your substrate? They'll sometimes get dark areas if kept on a dark substrate.

 

[HappyGeorge]

This is my male lab, was bought last week and was yellow with a slight blue beard when in the shops tank but went very blue when caught and has been this colour ever since, not fully grown yet but some incredible colour change. Only male lab in tank, water chemistry 0 Ammonia, 0 Nitrite, 20 Nitrate, and tank has Argos sand substrate.

 

[mmcrew]

Iv never seen a yellow lab go that colour before, iv seen them go slightly dark with the bandings which can be a sign or breeding etc but never that blue,

 

[JMatthew]

Blue? Really? Sure that's not some wacky cross-breed?

 

[HappyGeorge]

Well i can't be 100% sure but very reputable LFS and the fish was almost entirely yellow before bagging him, no sign of bars or colour on the fins and absolutely no blue on body. I'm sure time may tell but I know the change I saw, was reading about a strain called "Blue Streak". An unusual variant of yellow lab almost unheard of in captive bred. Who knows?

 

[JMatthew]

Wow! Not fair - now I want one!!!

 

[dthoffsett]

Wow, that very interesting. I've heard of the blue streak but have never seen one.

 

[HappyGeorge]

Well I suppose at the end of the day we all keep them for their beauty, and he is certainly that, so even if he isn't a yellow lab lets hope he creates some more lovely hybrids for my tank.

 

[tropic_john]

wow! Thats a stunning lab! imagine an ebjd x yellow lab! epic!

 

[stryper]

wow! Thats a stunning lab! imagine an ebjd x yellow lab! epic!

That is not a Lab at all. Remember some Malawis start off a golden yellow but males can then change colour. What exactly you have got i'm not sure but i'll have a look through some books. Nice fish though.

 

[HappyGeorge]

wow! Thats a stunning lab! imagine an ebjd x yellow lab! epic!

That is not a Lab at all. Remember some Malawis start off a golden yellow but males can then change colour. What exactly you have got i'm not sure but i'll have a look through some books. Nice fish though.

Any ideas would be interesting but Im sticking with the wild colour idea, in the absence of evidence to the contrary I don't think I made the colour change thing clear but what I saw was a yellow fish with a very slight blue beard get netted put in a bag and turn blue, we are talking yellow to blue in under 5 mins, today his colour has faded following putting three new Labs in the tank yesterday.

There is a whole raft of info on the net about the Blue streak Hap and some interesting reading but can't find a picture of the colour variant, will post another photo of him turned back to yellow when he shows off.

In the wild, the L. caeruleus is more often found in a light blue morph which is commonly referred to as the Blue Streak Hap. This color variation has a better chance of survival since they are easily camouflaged in the dark waters of the lake. The yellow morph stands out like a sore thumb and is much more likely to get snatched up by predators. Due to the ease of breeding Electric Yellows in captivity, they can be widely represented in the aquarium hobby despite their tendency to parish in the wild. In comparison to the increasing numbers of yellow, the Blue Streak numbers are dwindling in captivity due to lack of hobby interest. Many hobbyists do not even know they exist in any other color besides yellow.


History: Geoffrey Fryer first described this species in 1956 during his time at a fisheries station on Nkhata Bay. The species name caeruleus translates in English to the word blue, reflecting the colour of the first specimens that he observed. The blue variants of Labidochromis caeruleus mainly occur between Undu Reef and Thumbi Point. The “electric yellow” morph is just one of almost a dozen different morphologies seen in this species throughout the lake, including a blue morph for which it is named. The yellow Labidochromis is a geographical variant of L. caeruleus that has a much wider distribution on both sides of the lake. The yellow color variant is not present in all populations between Charo and Kajizingi. The population of L. caeruleus along the northern shore of Nkhoso Point, is pure white. Lion’s Cove, a very narrow and deep bay about 15 miles north of Nkhata Bay, is home to two different populations. Along the northern part of the bay, the fish are more yellow than that found along the southern side. The latter morph has yellow on the upper part of the body but white on the lower half. South of Kajizingi all populations known are pure white.
In the late seventies and early eighties there were three exporters operating in Malawi: Stuart Grant, Eric Fleet and Norman Edwards. Edwards was able to get two live specimens, a male and a female, out of the country in 1980. They were included in a shipment going to Swedish importer, Stig Jansson, in Stockholm. It was Pierre Brichard who first recognized the commercial potential of these fish. Jansson relinquished the pair to him and Brichard was able to produce a spawn. Once he had accumulated over 1000 offspring (1986) he began selling the yellows under the name Labidochromis “tanganicae”.
It wasn’t until 1986 that Stuart Grant first saw the yellows. Due to logistics he decided that it was unviable to collect the fish for export. Years later (around 1990) Grant decided to breed the fish at his fish station at Kambiri point. Unfortunately most were killed when an earthquake all but destroyed the ponds in which they were housed. He decided not to continue the breeding program and sent the remaining few specimens to colleague Gary Kratochval in the USA. Between 1980 and 1990 there were no exports of wild caught specimens and the majority of pond and tank raised yellows in the hobby had all derived from the single pair that Brichard bred. This colour variant while more rare in the lake, enjoys a distribution in the hobby that would easily outnumber the wild population by probably several hundred-fold.

Sorry for the long post but I thought the History was fascinating but maybe you all knew this already.

 

[JMatthew]

Don't apologize - that's information is a fantastic find.

So, in other words, the fish that we all know and love and so quickly identify by several distinct and straight forward indicators are not so easily identified in the wild. Fascinating that such a large population of aquarium kept fish have originated from only a few breeding pairs!

 

[stryper]

This is my male lab, was bought last week and was yellow with a slight blue beard when in the shops tank but went very blue when caught and has been this colour ever since, not fully grown yet but some incredible colour change. Only male lab in tank, water chemistry 0 Ammonia, 0 Nitrite, 20 Nitrate, and tank has Argos sand substrate.

Hi there mate. Well i've had a look through some books and not found any looking quite like yours. So went more on the shape of the fish. One that had that kind of shape is the Ps Elongatus greenback from Chemwezi rock. Not saying this is it at all. But the shape co insides very well. Plus i've never known a Lab be yellow then change like this. Joannis Msobo deep or Saulosi do this change thing. But i would say this is NOT!! a lab. So i would say this is of the old Pseudothropheus mould.