# exCichlasoma ornatum ... or gephyrum ... or what???



## notho2000 (Dec 8, 2012)

I'm puzzled about this fish of mine. Of the original six, I have only one left, losing the others through "an unfortunate set of circumstances". It is now about 18 months old and at 5-6". It displays the colors in the photos constantly, but when younger, the bars were not as prominent. It is a very shy, almost reclusive fish, and was originally purchased as a WC 'ornatum'. But having checked other threads, it really doesn't look much like the so-called ornatums pictured, in that those do not have distinct vertical barring and have orange red colors in the fins, especially the tail. Could the barring in mine be a stress pattern? And the lack of orange pigments a 'location' issue? There are three pics of mine and then a picture from a thread on the ACA forum (DRE's fish) Can anyone tell me if it is the same species as Dre's and if it is a male or female? Thanks.


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## CjCichlid (Sep 14, 2005)

I have no first hand experience with ornatum but the body shape looks right and those definitely look like stress bars to me. You said it is very shy and reclusive. I'd bet it's just stressed out if it's sharing a tank with other more outgoing, rambunctious cichlids.

Here's a pic I pulled from google.. looks pretty similar to yours.


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## BC in SK (Aug 11, 2012)

From what I read, the barring is more often associated with dominance. http://www.cichlidae.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=13880 According to the last post in this link, both species can be barred.

There certainly are a number of pictures of specimens with barring.....including a very large specimen that Jeff Rapps used to have a picture of on his site. At least what Jeff Rapps initially imported is now considered to be either _"Cichlasoma" gephryum_ or an undescribed species (_"Cichlasoma" cf. ornatum_)

No idea how these species (or regional variants) can be distinguished, with out knowing for certain where the fish was collected from.


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