Melanochromis Johanni Question

[Sonny Disposition]

Hi all. A few auctions ago, I brought home some M. johanni from a CCA meeting. (They were cheap, so I thought I'd try them out.) Anyway, they've turned out to be much neater than I thought they'd be. The males are midnight blue, and the lone female, who has produced a couple of mouthfuls of young now, is a fainter purple-blue.

I've also seen M. Johanni where the males are blue and the females are yellow. So, my question, for Sarah and any other of you particularly knowledgeable cichlid folk, is whether the two forms are different varieties of the same species, or different subspecies of the same species.

I like the yellow females a little better than the purple ones. If I ever come across some, I'd like to add them to my breeding stock. But know if it meant producing a subspecies hybrid.

Let me know your thoughts.

Thanks.

 

[Andrew]

I don't know if this is what you might be seeing, but there's an "electric blue johanni" or "electric blue maingano" that is a different species, Melanochromis cyanorhabdos. In this species the males and females are essentially the same color, especially as young fish, black with blue stripes. Looking at the Konings book (Malawi Cichlids, 3rd ed, page 105), the females of the "true" M. johanni are all yellow with no stripes.

In the trade there are also fish attributed to be M. johanni where the females have black stripes and yellow to yellow-ish color in between the stripes. I would guess that these are hybrids between the variety of Melanochromis that have been imported and bred commercially, but don't know for sure.

 

[Sonny Disposition]

OK. So my fish could have been misindentified. In the auction, they were labeled as M. johanni. In which case I wouldn't want to keep them with a closely related species.

Are you sure there isn't a form of M. johanni with blue females? I've seen more than one reference to them.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Andrew @ Dec 31 2008, 04:39 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div>

I don't know if this is what you might be seeing, but there's an "electric blue johanni" or "electric blue maingano" that is a different species, Melanochromis cyanorhabdos. In this species the males and females are essentially the same color, especially as young fish, black with blue stripes. Looking at the Konings book (Malawi Cichlids, 3rd ed, page 105), the females of the "true" M. johanni are all yellow with no stripes.

In the trade there are also fish attributed to be M. johanni where the females have black stripes and yellow to yellow-ish color in between the stripes. I would guess that these are hybrids between the variety of Melanochromis that have been imported and bred commercially, but don't know for sure.[/b]

 

[Andrew]

Are you sure there isn't a form of M. johanni with blue females? I've seen more than one reference to them.


I have no idea on this one. I just know what I see come from the producers and that isn't generally one of the ones available from the farms.

 

[RIFT_LAKES_RULE]

Hi, like Andrew said I don't know of a M. johanni where the female is a blue color. The M. johanni has solid yellow females and the M. cyaneorhabdos (formerly maingano which is still the trade name) females are dark w/light blue horizontal barring identical to the male of this species. I also noticed you said your male was midnight blue, does he have any horizontal barring? All of the male johanni species that I've seen have horizontal barring of some sort. I also thumbed thru my Ad Konings 4th ed and didn't see one. Any chance you could post some pic's? I'd be interested to see em.

 

[Sonny Disposition]

See my related post quoting Pam Chin of ACA. It looks like the species I have is M. cyaneorhabdos, which was formerly sold as "electric blue" johanni. A different species entirely.

I just now got around to posting some photos on photobucket, like some have advised me to do before. Anyway, here's a link to what they look like. The dark one is the male, and the light blue one is the female, I think. She looks more purple in real life than in the photo. They're accidentally in the shot, as I grabbed the camera to take a picture of the Maylandia sp. long pelvic sparring. (Always remember to keep the glass clean, just in case.)

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (swim lil fishy swim @ Jan 1 2009, 02:26 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div>

Hi, like Andrew said I don't know of a M. johanni where the female is a blue color. The M. johanni has solid yellow females and the M. cyaneorhabdos (formerly maingano which is still the trade name) females are dark w/light blue horizontal barring identical to the male of this species. I also noticed you said your male was midnight blue, does he have any horizontal barring? All of the male johanni species that I've seen have horizontal barring of some sort. I also thumbed thru my Ad Konings 4th ed and didn't see one. Any chance you could post some pic's? I'd be interested to see em.[/b]

 

[RIFT_LAKES_RULE]

Yup, thats the Melanochromis cyaneorhabdos. Great lookin fish. Glad you got it ID'd. Not sure how hard it'd be to get more females, but I'd recommend having more than one female for the males. Andrew can probably help you out there.

 

[Sonny Disposition]

If he can't, then I've got some fry coming up. The big central rock pile does a lot to diffuse aggression in the tank. Right now, the female is in another tank with the fry.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (swim lil fishy swim @ Jan 1 2009, 03:48 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div>

Yup, thats the Melanochromis cyaneorhabdos. Great lookin fish. Glad you got it ID'd. Not sure how hard it'd be to get more females, but I'd recommend having more than one female for the males. Andrew can probably help you out there.[/b]