New additiions to the family

My son and I went and visited Kevin at APFP yesterday, and helped him out a bit. Picked up 3 fish for me and 1 for my son, and 1 more fancy pleco to add to my Pleco collection.

Noticed that his stock is looking pretty nice. He has some nice Africans that I havent seen before,just got in a bunch of some rare Jewels, and his C&S Am selection is looking nice. And for those other Pleco enthusiasts, he has several different types of bristlenose, phantoms, and others that I can not remember.

Can you tell me what the fish are?

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And my sons
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nice royal pleco

Whoa caquetaia spectabilis!! did kevin get them from rapps? and a nice melanurus also.

Good guess. The spectabilis has been a fish I have been wanting for awhile now. Rapps has them available for $125 @ 4". The small one I got is about 3.5" and the larger one about 4.5". Kevin got them from an importer down in Houston. Kevin has been and will start getting more of his WC fish from this guy.

The Melanurus/Synspilum came from Conkel/Gage. The Royal pleco L191 also came from Houston.

Come on African keepers, any idea what my sons fish is?

awesome. are you gonna try and spawn the spectabilis? if so put me on the list for fry.

Yes I will be. Got the small one in my 400. Hopefully it puts on size quickly.

you dont have them together?

Not at this time. The larger one is getting rough with the smaller one, and with how much they cost me, I dont want to risk it right now.

makes sense. got lucky with my umbees as aggression was a big concern but so far none. hopefully the specs will get it together and do the dirty down the road

is your son's a red empress? I picked up one there yesterday along with a couple of frontosas.... on your recommendation, I was very impressed with the selection, just wish i had more money to throw around! I bought my red empress for 40, it's currently hiding from me, but i cant wait for him to become comfortable enough to be out all the time (as he is double the size of my other africans!
thanks again for the rec. and you got some great fish there!

lloyd378 wrote:is your son's a red empress? I picked up one there yesterday along with a couple of frontosas.... on your recommendation, I was very impressed with the selection, just wish i had more money to throw around! I bought my red empress for 40, it's currently hiding from me, but i cant wait for him to become comfortable enough to be out all the time (as he is double the size of my other africans!
thanks again for the rec. and you got some great fish there!

His fish is the Protomelas taeniolatus ndiwe "Fire Blue"

how similar is it to the red empress? mine has a blue face with red body and an orange colored dorsal fin (he is about 4-5 inches long), which looks an awful lot like the googled images of the "fire blue" . the young man at APFP told me it was a red empress. I don't care either way as it is one of the prettiest african's i've seen to date. thanks for any info.

I guess the Fire Blue is a morph of the red Empress. The red empress is called Protomelas taeniolatus 'red empress'

Very nice Spectabilis. Seems like there is a rave for these hard to get fishes.

Oh also, nice syns! (Not going to be labeled a melanurus ever for me)

madness wrote:The Melanurus/Synspilum came from Conkel/Gage.

Where those the ones that were in the $30 price range? I think you ended up with the nice looking one he had that was top dog in the tank. The thing was mean, mean, mean when I saw it. Will be a stunner when it grows up!

DMD123 wrote:

madness wrote:The Melanurus/Synspilum came from Conkel/Gage.

Where those the ones that were in the $30 price range? I think you ended up with the nice looking one he had that was top dog in the tank. The thing was mean, mean, mean when I saw it. Will be a stunner when it grows up!

Yes it was the nicest looking of the 4. He had awesome colors and fins. He us definitely not top dog in my tank

I was interesting to watch him compared to the Syn in the tank next door. The other one was pretty easy going and this one was pretty mean.

Nice African; bet he'll be a pretty one when he's all colored up. I was in APFP on Sunday and saw he had some good looking ones with decent size to them.

Betty wrote:Nice African; bet he'll be a pretty one when he's all colored up. I was in APFP on Sunday and saw he had some good looking ones with decent size to them.

Yea, Kevin has got some real nice looking Africans in there right now.

vancouver_98683 wrote:Oh also, nice syns! (Not going to be labeled a melanurus ever for me)

Thanks, i know the 2 are supposedly the same fish, but i can clearly tell the difference. And i like the Mel/Syn the best.

I've been looking for Spectabilis for about 1.5 years now. Hopefully i have one each.