Black Flowerhorn Holiday Dance Party
On Dec 1, my male and female Black Flowerhorns (see picture of the female as a juvenile in dsuperman's entry Tanks!) starting dancing up a storm. A lot of maturity has gone on since they first danced a little this past summer. The female had then had a clutch of sterile eggs, as there was no male around, and they they were both marginally large enough to breed. Since then, they have become much darker in color, moslty grey and black but retaining a red facial blush, and they have grow to 7.5 inches long for the female by 4.5 inches high, and 9.5 inches long for the male by 6 inches high. They now look extremely similar to the "Grey Thunder Flowerhorn" Vietnamese poster that was presented by Anthony Tu of the Frontosa Factory at last summer's Monster Fish Convention. They have both been eating a lot, mosty shrimp, minnows, bloodworms, krill pellets, flowerhorn food pellets, and Cobalt Aquatics Pro Breeder Food flakes.
The female initiates the dancing most of the time and they have gone through about a dozen of the typical dannce steps, plus one new one which I have never seen before: One of the pair puts its snout in the corner at a 45 degree angle and shimmies until the partner comes over and nudges it. Then, they reverse roles and do it on the other end of the tank. Considering that they have been moving some pebbles around, it may be a ritual to decide where to dig. They have a large rock tunnel in their tank where one usually sleeps, but yesterday they were following each other in one end and out the other. They are not eating a lot while dancing, which is typical of Flowerhorns; they general let you know when they are hungry when they stop dancing . Last night they danced for 6 hours.
__________________
Dr. Robert Price
|