# Acei fry color... confused... again!



## bma57 (Sep 16, 2007)

I've had a 10g full of acei and estherae fry growing out for a couple of months. Several weeks ago I posted pics of my young acei and asked about their color which is a very pale lavender, nowhere close to the deep purple/blue of the adults. Everyone said they looked normal and would darken as they matured.

Fast forward to now... One of my adult acei females spit in the tank recently (I don't have room to grow out more right now) and I have two survivor fry hiding out in the rocks. I estimate they are a week to 10 days old... and they are SUPER DARK! :-? They are as dark as the adults and waaaaaay darker than the much older fry. If you have any ideas as to why, I'm really curious.

FWIW the main tank is 120g with 4 acei, 4 estherae, 4 labs, 1 venustus, 1 Hap sp. 44, 1 OB peacock, and 1 BN pleco. Thanks.


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## Peacock88 (Jan 21, 2007)

This is probably cuz they aren't very comfortable, living on the edge, surviving. They have to deal with large, aggressive fish, probably scared $#*&less. They are more tense and excited while the others are carefree in their own tank, no preditors to be scared of.

I have acei 2 different sizes in their own 10g. The weird thing i noticed was that when young they have dark stripes. My largest are maybe a little over an inch but have turned a nice shiny blue. 
Have you seen the stripping on your young ones too?


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## Laurel (Jun 17, 2007)

I have 1 that survived being spit in the tank. It was brownish grey for quite some time, and is just now starting to develop blue/purple color, but was never light. That information probably didn't help at all, but if it did, I'm glad. :fish:


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## bma57 (Sep 16, 2007)

Peacock88 said:


> Have you seen the striping on your young ones too?


Oh yeah. Very clear vertical bars for the first several weeks.


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## Peacock88 (Jan 21, 2007)

Ok cool, just making sure _mine_ are normal too.


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## Linka (Aug 14, 2007)

Not to worrie. Mine is just the same. I have the P. Acei Ngara where the adults are black with white fins. The fry has their own tank and their color is more grayish, but when they are let out in the big tank they get as black as the night.. :lol:


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## Peacock88 (Jan 21, 2007)

Thats got to be pretty cool to see the quick transformation!


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## Linka (Aug 14, 2007)

Yep, they change very rapidly. Almost like they wanna tell the big Acei`s that they are "big" to. 
Strange. :lol:


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## bma57 (Sep 16, 2007)

Interesting update... interesting to me anyway. Today I did a WC and found one of the dark recently born fry in my overflow. I caught the little guy, still deep blue, and put him in my fry tank. When I checked on him an hour or so later... you guessed it... he was pale, silvery lavender like the rest of the juvies.

It's got me wondering now if I can expect a quick darkening when my big fry grow out enough to go back in the main tank. Fascinating little critters, aren't they.


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## ValleyMan (Jan 17, 2008)

I stripped 60-70 acei today and have them in a 38L. Some are light and some are dark, all have the vertical bars.


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## DNK (Jun 8, 2007)

Just tagging on to this thread. 
I obtained some juvenile Acei Ngara a couple of week ago. I've seen one of the parents (who is a navy blue with a white tail.) My juvies are brown with slightly white tips on their tails.
Are Ngara fry and juvies always brownish?


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## Linka (Aug 14, 2007)

Hmmm.. mine are not brownish, but black with metallic blue shine on the head. And they have white fins. When they are fry they have a gray/silver color like fadet black but i`ve never seen any brownish.


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## DNK (Jun 8, 2007)

Linka said:


> Hmmm.. mine are not brownish, but black with metallic blue shine on the head. And they have white fins. When they are fry they have a gray/silver color like fadet black but i`ve never seen any brownish.


Forgot to add that several of mine also have a metallic blue shine on their heads (can't see it from the pic.)
Gotta wait until they're a bit bigger I suppose to see if they'll change colour!


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## Peacock88 (Jan 21, 2007)

My inch or so fry change their color and want to know if maybe my genes are dirty.
Sometimes they are a nice purple blue, sometimes pale, sometimes stripped (very rare now though), and sometimes they have this really dark coloring from eye level to they're tail (horozontally). This only happens every once and a while but it goes along what i'd guess is their backbone, right in the middle of their body down from the back of the gills to the tail.

It looks like it's the verticle stripes going away, but IDK.

Is this common among your fry???

I know it may be hard to visuallize without a picture but my camara sucks and its hard to take pics of them.


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## SpeedFreak (Mar 14, 2008)

I got to say its kind of nice to see that everyone else is having coloring issues. I know my demasoni and labs are setting me crazy and I've been doing everything to get that nice color. I guess it just takes time. I'm looking into getting some Acei but I want the ones with yellow fins. Just out of curiosity where did you guys get yours?



bma57 said:


> Interesting update... interesting to me anyway. Today I did a WC and found one of the dark recently born fry in my overflow. I caught the little guy, still deep blue, and put him in my fry tank. When I checked on him an hour or so later... you guessed it... he was pale, silvery lavender like the rest of the juvies.
> 
> It's got me wondering now if I can expect a quick darkening when my big fry grow out enough to go back in the main tank. Fascinating little critters, aren't they.


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## bma57 (Sep 16, 2007)

And the experiment is now complete. I added a couple of my bigger fry back into the main tank and they immediately darkened like the adults. Amazing little beasties!


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## SpeedFreak (Mar 14, 2008)

They must feel safer in the big tank.


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