# Red Texas



## abyss

What the **** do they look like? There not around here? :-?


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## Nathan43

A red texas is a hybrid, usually between a blood red king kong parrot and a texas cichid.
The nice quality ones cost hundreds of dollars...


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## gage

Nathan43 said:


> A red texas is a hybrid, usually between a blood red king kong parrot and a texas cichid.
> The nice quality ones cost hundreds of dollars...


or even thousands in some cases, here is a picture of a nice one:


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## abyss

WOW I guess I'll have to sell a lot of fronies to get them!


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## css virginia

I would like to have one of those in my tank! Nice colors. 8)


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## rmcder

gage said:


> Nathan43 said:
> 
> 
> 
> A red texas is a hybrid, usually between a blood red king kong parrot and a texas cichid.
> The nice quality ones cost hundreds of dollars...
> 
> 
> 
> or even thousands in some cases, here is a picture of a nice one:
Click to expand...

Wow! That is one beautiful fish!


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## abyss

I have just seen some with black on the upper body and dorsal fin but the base is red with the blue spots are these a cross again or just poor stock? :-?


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## abyss

Just had a guy with those black bodied red texas tell me that they are only young and that they are plealing? What the ?????? :-?


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## gage

it is fading, all Red Texas are born looking exactly like little carpintis juvi's, but just like a midas/red devil will turn jet black, then peel into a beige-orange-red depending on quality of the fish.

the black marks, in a way, are a sign of quality, because it shows that the fish is going to turn its color from gray-green to beige-red.

thing is, most turn even duller then this color:










which is why it costs so much to buy one of that red quality.

usually the way it goes with RT is when you breed the Carpintis and KKP to get them, you end up with a bunch of babies and less then 25% of them will actually fade, the rest stay looking like a normal carpintis there whole life. Then, out of that 25%, you are lucky to get one out of that that is more intense then a mere, rather nasty looking beige color, and if you are lucky enough to have one of the hundreds of fry actually turn a nice deep orange-red, chances are the KKP genes are much more evident to the point that there are barely any pearling on it. this is where some serious selective breeding comes in, which is a real pain in the butt when only .1% of Red Texas males are fertile, which means even MORE breeding to finally get a male that is fertile, because you will want to breed it back to the KKP for more red. if you want more pearls you have to find a female, which isnt as difficult, but RT mature at a very slow rate, so your waiting a year or more to finally bring the fry to sexual maturity.

also remember, if the body shape isnt perfect (shorter and squared off) is isnt even worth keeping, any body shape other then this is not worth as much.

must also have a fan tail, cannot be circle, must be more of a sideways triangle, other wise no one that knows anything about flowerhorns/selectively bred hybrids wont buy it.

after all that BS of having to perfect color AND pearls with a nice body shape and fins, which can take years upon years, you now have to breed a nuchal hump into the gene pool, making sure not to introduce any genes besides Carpintis and KKp, and finding a carpintis or female kkp (remember males are infertile) with a nuchal hump is extremely difficult, so chances are you will have to selectively breed carpintis to have a nuchal hump, which will take even more years, unless your willing to fork up 500 bux for a male with a good sized nuchal hump.

after you find your male with the nuchal, and you find a female RT with the bright intense red and bright even pearling, you breed them in hopes of having a single fry out of hundreds with the nuchal hump AND the color and pearls, and if you dont you keep breeding the pair until you do, dont forget it takes RT a long time to mature because of the synspilum used in KKp's, so your waiting yet another year to see if any of your fry develop a nuchal hump, and if not, like i said, you gotta breed the pair again.

now, once you have the fry with the nuchal hump, you will want to breed it to pass on the great genes you have created, here is the problem, approx 99% of the RT with a nuchal hump at all are males, and remember what i said, 99.99% of all male RT are infertile, back to the drawing board of trying to make either a female with nice color pearls and nuchal hump, or trying to make a fertile male, both methods are really not in your favor, so it will probably take another 5 years or so of breeding to get this.

sorry for the long speech about this, but i feel it is important to let people know why fish such as SRT are very expensive, lets take this guy here for example:










this is a flawless SRT, nice fins, nice nuchal hump, nice color, nice pearling, this guys also probably took about 30+ years to make, probably more like 50 years, so naturally he is very expensive (this is the quality that ranges in the thousands of dollars range.

again, sorry for the long speech, but like i said, i think it is important for all fish hobbyists, mostly the purists, to understand where these hybrids get there high price tags


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## abyss

Wow!! Didn't relize so much time and effort went into them, It's great to see someone so passionate about keep the good strains if only their were more people like you around. =D>


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## Nathan43

Right on, I am glad someone explained it fully. Well put


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## gage

abyss said:


> Wow!! Didn't relize so much time and effort went into them, It's great to see someone so passionate about keep the good strains if only their were more people like you around. =D>


:lol: thank you, im just here to help


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