Well You Could Buy My 90 Gallon, Lol , It Is A Show Tank, Would Give Him 10 Gal More Room  Lol

joey-mullen wrote:

Your best bet to get a good grade flowerhorn is online threw a reputable breeder. anything local are very low grade from what i have seen. make sure you get an example of the fish, or the parents first.

An 80 gal would be fantastic for life. although many keep them in 40-55 gallon tanks by themselves.

Not sure how you could call people that experiment with different cross breeds as being reputable :P I'm definitely glad that this fad seems to be dying out! I'd just get a true trimac or midas. They make awesome wet pets. Eventually, even a 75-90gal will start to seem cramped for a full grown male. My midas makes his 75gal seem small.

Well just looking at some of them, H. carpintis is mixed in with many of them and maybe lyonsi as well. And that's the thing, you really don't know what you're getting. If it's one of the mostly midas/trimac crosses, a male will easily break 12", as both species will top out over 14". And what's an undesirable trait that arises from too large of a tank? From their bloodlines, they are going to be very territorial animals. That's what makes amphilophus genus fish such great wet pets. Pretty sure Spencer Jack has trimacs available right now.

Stunting won't come from too little physical space, it's probably more of an effect from substandard water conditions, or both. Small tank, large fish leads to very high waste products in the water column. Either way, it's a sick and reprehensible practice. *shudder*

And from prices I've seen on aquabid, the fancier FHs are pretty crazy in price. I would imagine that any that you find available here in the maritimes will be the cheap kind and look very much like trimacs to begin with. Or at least that's my impression after seeing different batches at PU over the years.

that fish doesnt even look real its so nice , but if i got a batch of small fish id have to wait and watch them grow, ive done this with everyfish i have and i just want to get something larger from the get go so i dont have to wait so long to see a beautiful fish.

hilden wrote:

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa10 … amalau.gif

I seen that online today actually. very nice.

ps, really, anyone upset about flowerhorns being bred for the cosmetically pleasing effect they have to humans should ask themselves about dogs, and cats. those animals have also been bred JUST for human enjoyment.  Flowerhorns are.. fish. The other fish don't laugh at them for looking funny, they kick their bums if they just get in their SPACE! Other dogs rip on other dogs for looking silly, you know it!

Hey,

If anyone wants flowerhorns I can get some of the highest quality flowerhorns on the market, they would be shipped direct from Indo, Singapore, and Japan. Many ranging between $800 -$2000 for a high quality fish, but I can obtain really nice fish for much cheaper. The best way of obtaining a good quality FH is buying an adult individual. Buying a young fish with good genetics isn't going to guarantee you a nice fish. Like most cichlids, FH start off with very little color, and sometimes the adults just don't turn out nice, there's no way to tell how the adult will be from a young individual, it's all guess work. High grade flowerhorns are picked through batches of hundreds of fry and grown up by the breeder. The lower grade ones are either dumped, or sold to the pet trade for "pet quality FH". So even if they have names like Kamfa or Kamalau attached to them doesn't guarantee they will grow up to be like the show quality flower horns you see on the internet.

The genetics of these fish are hidden secrets that have been past down over generations, similar to high quality hybrid rays, arowana, and koi. A specific combination of hybridization and years of selective breeding has resulted in the true high grade flowerhorns in the market. The holdback individuals are selected and grown out, and sold as high priced show fish. This is not to say you can't get a nice Flowerhorn from a small individual, it's just not guaranteed. It's not only genetics, or a "holdback quality" fish that creates a nice show specimen. Husbandry throughout the life of the fish serves a big part of it. Most of these fish are grown up being fed high quality color enhancing food, kept alone in bare tanks in order to keep all their fins and scales in perfect condition and are given a 90 percent water change daily, among other things. The show quality fish are worth every penny, especially when you can a nice one for under $500.

I hope this clears up some stuff about flowerhorns. The info is a tab mixed up, but I hope you get something out of it. Any other questions about them, don't be affraid to pm me.

Good Luck,

Justin Morash