Yellow Labs/electric Yellows

[Tommy Gunnz]

Good evening everyone!

Got a quick question which I think might not be able to be answered......

I have 6 yellow labs/electric yellows, which ever name you would like, and one of them is much more pale and has very distinct vertical banding on it. The rest are bright yellow and very faint banding. I am wondering if this is a sign of the fish being a male or female or if perhaps I have been slipped a different species of fish without knowing.

I have had this group for about 6 months now and I am starting to think that one of them may be 'holding' eggs in its mouth, but I cannot be sure. Its cheeks are not puffed out, but it appears like it always has its mouth shut or just barely open. I am not really trying to breed or anything like that yet, but it would be cool if it did happen. I guess it would also be hectic since I do not have my Q-tank up yet as I just moved about a month ago.

Any help would be great! Thanks

 

[Ferris]

It could just be from a bad strain, because of the high demand for them they are bred on a massive scale and i see a lot of poor examples offered for sale.

Any chance of a pic to be sure?

 

[denis coghlan]

Like ferris I agree that it has a lot to do with the genetic quality of the fish. But I am also of the opinion that it has to do with the environment in which the fish is kept eg. water quality, aggression levels, breeding status and diet.

These are my opinions from keeping these guys.

Water quality: This has only every happened to me once, thankfully. I was away for fours days and I had asked a member of the family to feed my fish. While I was gone, the filter on the fry tank with about 50-60 lab fry packed it up, apparently within two days fish started to die!! The family member, thought that the fish were dieing from a lack of food and increased the amount of food going into the tank. "BIG MISTAKE". I came home on Sunday to a tank with about 20 or so dead fish, but the most remarkable thing was the colour of the remaining live fry in the tank. They had all turned brown and the vertical barring was very visible. I carried out water changes of the next couple of days and the remaining fish turned back to being a nice yellow colour again. This suggests to me that poor water quality will lead to poor colouration on your fish, so I would recommend that water changes be carried out at least once a week at between 20-30%.

Aggression/Unwanted attention levels: I have seen my female labs show vertical barring nearly instantly when the male in the tank is trying to be amorous with them and they are not interested. Because I have a ratio of 1:3, male to female ratio, individual female are not being constantly harassed, there for they don't seem to show the vertical barring as much. Also, the aggression level in the tank is low, making for a nice relaxed environment. I would assume that in a tank where the aggression level is higher, the labs would want to make themselves as inconspicuous as possible therefore not show such bright colouration and thus the vertical barring can be seen.

Breeding status: If a fish is in good condition and is ready to mate, whether it be male or female then the colouration of the fish is normally quite striking. I have noticed this in the past that when I female has just started to hold she will show little or no vertical barring, but by the third week of holding and not eating the fish is very thin, has turned a very pale yellow colour (nearly white is some areas) and the vertical barring is so prominent that it nearly joins to form one large patch along the flank of the fish.

Diet: With diet it is important to remember that Lab's are insectivores not herbivores like the other mbuna relations. Therefore they will need an addition source of insect/crustacean protein in their diet to show off their turn colouration. I feed mias shrimp and cichlid mix (contains other types of shrimp) twice a week and this seem to work.

Like I said before, I agree with Ferris that the vertical barring has a lot to do with genetic quality and it is a result of mass production of this great fish. But there is a lot that you can do as a hobbyist to help mask/ reduce the visibility of this vertical barring.


These are some of my labs, they are sort of a before and after selection. The first pictures are when I initially got my fish. All of the fish showed vertical barring as a result of stress from being moved and being underfed. The follwing pictures are the most recent and you can see that the lateral barring has all but disappeared.

After roughly 8 months or so!

Ps. I really like these fish and no mbuna setup is complete without them.

 

[Nick Sw]

Interesting info about the fish Tanks a Lot, I`ve noticed a similar thing today , I`ve got Ick on a couple of fish so I`ve added the Interpet treatment, jacked up the temp (only a bit) I also added an airstone (yes the one I tried to give away !) anyway my filter has got semi clogged up which I think was gunk in the filter wool which has led to less surface agitation and the airstone vibrated is self along the tank and got the hose snagged and stopped working , I came home at lunch time to see a few fish gasping at the surface which I knew wasn`t good I immediately sorted everything out but I noticed sort of "black" on one of the labs which worried me after I while I could clearly see the fish were back to normal and the "black" on the lab had gone.
Touchwood he`s ok. I think maybe it`s stress like you say but shows better on the lighter coloured labs.
Let me know it`s something else that could be wrong BTW.

 

[Tommy Gunnz]

Tanks and Nick,

Thanks for your response to my question.

I have had these 6 labs for about 6 months (at least) and bought five of them at a smaller size and one at a slightly larger size. All have been fed on both ciclid stick/floating pellets and blood worms, mysis shrimp and brine shrimp. The tank's water parameters are all good, with weekly water changes in the range of 20 to 25%, without fail. They were, until recently kept with three kennyi (one male and two female) and a johanni (male). I traded them in a couple of days ago due to the aggression of the kennyi.

I have these two pictures, which I took about five minutes ago with my camera. The camera is one of those digital video cameras with the still picture option, which I admit is not very good when taking pics of something that is moving (sort of ironic I think...).

Here is the picture of the muted yellow fish in my tank:

And this is a picture of one of the other fish. This fish is a better representation of what all the fish look like in my tank, with the exception of the 'odd ball' I am referring to.

You can see two fish in the 'good' picture, and so I hope that will help with my question because it shows that my tank is healthy and the fish well taken care of (not that I feel you are implying they aren't, but more to explain why I am curious about the light yellow fish). From what you have said, I am starting to think that I may have gotten a fish with some less than desirable DNA, but I of course, will still keep him (or her).

Are there any tips you may have for me that could help brighten this fish up or help improve its health if it is a victim of over breeding. In a lot of ways, this is a nice situation in that it appears like I have a fish of a different color, while not having to worry about compatability issues!

Oh, as far as sexing my 6 labs, are there any tell tale signs? I notice one has what looks to be one egg spot on its tail, not sure if that is the definitive answer or not.

 

[BiffMalawi]

I have one lab that looks alot like the one in your first picture. I have him in a tank with 12 other labs. He was fine when he was younger(he was my first one) but has looked like that for about 2 months. The tank is a little aggressive as it seems I have too many males, but he is the only one to show this colouring. I am inclined to believe it's the breeding thing. I don't think there is really anyway to combat poor breeding. The things you are doing to keep the others healthy is probably all you can do.

As far as sexing goes, males are supposed to have a larger black dorsal stripe, black ventral and anal fins. I have heard that males should also have egg spots, although I am not sure that makes sense, as I think their purpose is to stimulate the males to follow the female during courtship and laying(egg). Unfortunately improper breeding has made these characteristics imperfect for sexing as females are now showing up with black on thier fins.

I understand that the only definite way is venting. Vents are on the underside of the fish just forward of the anal fin and are the anus and genital openings. Males should be similar sizes oo and females one larger than the other(to accomodate egg laying) Oo.

I have never done this before and I am unsure how old the fish must be or how difficult it is. It sounds stressful to the fish considering each one must be caught and taken out of the tank and held.

I am having a venting party this weekend and I am going to attempt sexing all of my labs in hopes of establishing a 1m to 4f ratio. If you are interested I can let you know what I learn.

 

[Tommy Gunnz]

Thanks Biff. I would be really interested in hearing what you learn by your venting party, although you may want to look into a simple beer and friends type party in the future, before you are considered odd and shunned by society! Just kidding.

To help with the eggspots thing, I believe the reason the male has them is because it wants the female to follow it as it collects the eggs in its mouth. If the female believes the eggspot is an egg and tried to catch it, there is a better chance for the female to collect more sperm with the eggs, and hence, better chances for more fry.

I wouldnt have figured this out myself if it wasnt explained to me. Sort of like the fiction and non-fiction thing....that confuses me every time! (its like saying a book is not true (fiction) or not-not true (non-fiction). Totally backwards in my opinion, but what do I know anyways!

 

[BiffMalawi]

Well That is the last venting party I ever go to. You know you are at a bad party when you can't tell the males from the females.

I caught, I looked, I didn't see!

I looked at fish I new were females(held) and ones I knew were male(no doubt at all) I looked at a bunch of others.

I still have no clue. I gave up. I picked the prettiest gave away the ugliest. I'm done.