Australian natives - Attention Neale, and his BW book 5/1/08
Hi Neale,
Not a question, more of a conversation. You can tell me to stop bothering you if you want. I don't often get the chance to talk Australian freshwater natives (I use the term freshwater loosely), which are a bit of a favourite of mine. I have read some of Bruce's work, although I can't say I've read any of his stuff on Pseudomugil. Will have to try to get hold of a copy of your book. Just to make sure, its title is "Brackish-Water Fishes: An Aquarist's Guide to Identification, Care & Husbandry" right?
<Indeed so; should be available at all good bookstores, or else via your library system. I have to admit to enjoying Bruce's chapter enormously, as well as Richard Mleczko's chapter on Mudskippers, another group of fish Aussies may well be able to enjoy better than anyone else.>
I've done a fair bit of research on many Australian natives. Both personal and professional. I did my masters thesis on Melanotaenia splendida splendida. An often overlooked yet stunning rainbowfish if I do say so myself. Some of the regional colour morphs I've collected far outshine many of the more common rainbowfish sold in the trade. My personal favourite has to be the ones from a little stream on the way to Greenvale. Absolutely stunning. I still have some of those from my research (they'd be pushing 8 years now).
<I would tend to agree with you on this species. It used to be quite commonly traded here in the UK (along with M. maccullochi) as the "Australian rainbow" but you hardly ever see these fish now. They always seemed incredibly variable, and also very hardy and reliable. Seemed to put with anything, even quite salty brackish water.>
I do agree that the P. signifer colour up fantastically in brackish water, they also tend to live longer and grow bigger as well, but I've personally found they breed much better in fresh (more eggs, with a significantly increased fertilisation, hatching and survival rate). For several years I changed their water type seasonally. Three months full
brackish, three months changing from brackish to fresh, three months full fresh, and three months changing from fresh to brackish. I do have to admit I've gotten rather lazy with that one of late and have had them in full fresh for at least a year now. I do tend to try to breed any that I wild collect so in some ways it's probably more practical to keep them in freshwater from the breeding point of view. I've had quite good luck breeding all the different specie of blue eye and found that even most of the euryhaline specie breed best in freshwater. That's one of the reasons I want to speak to more people about the P. cyanodorsalis. My prior experience tells me they should do well in fresh, but my gut tells me they may be more brackish then any of the others I've kept.
<Bruce says P. cyanodorsalis is "more consistently found in brackish water".>
I've had a few of the gudgeons as well and have had limited success with them. The Empire Gudgeon (Hypseleotris compressa) and Northern Purple Spotted Gudgeon (Mogurnda mogurnda) are my newest projects. I've had luck with the empire from the Rolling Stone area, and am working on my success with the purple spotted. I am hoping to go out west and get
some from the interior in a year or so when I have their reproduction a bit more stable. I've heard the ones from some of the inland areas are beauties.
<Oddly enough, Morgunda spp. and also Peacock Gobies are quite common here, and some stores have Chlamydogobius eremius as well, another superb little goby. Gudgeons (or Sleeper Gobies as we call them) are fairly popular, thanks to their good colours and generally hardy nature. Regular gobies always seem that bit more fussy about their food.>
Unfortunately a lot of the regional colour morphs are being threatened. One of the reasons why I collect and breed according to location. Up here the Gambusia is doing a real number on the blue eyes and tilapia are threatening just about everything else. It's always disappointing to me when I go to an area to collect fish and discover an introduced species when I am there. I always try to remove any introduced that I can catch, some are harder then others. Unfortunately it seems every time I go out there are more introduced fish and more different types then the year before. The number of Oscar I've been finding of late has me a bit concerned. I also caught a disturbing amount of other cichlid species which I hadn't encountered before. I always take a deep breath
and enjoy any place I go that I don't encounter any introduced fish although those seem to be getting fewer and farther between. The flooding we get during the wet season is the real problem. It allows the introduced fish to get to new water that they wouldn't be able to access otherwise.
<This is a problem everywhere. The UK govt. has recently gotten serious about limiting the trade in species that could become established in UK waters. Aquarists do have to deal with the fact that they, or at least their trade, has been responsible for some terrible exotic species introductions. So while I'm not wild about the idea of "white lists" of species my government says we can keep, there's an argument for making the hobby a lot more aware of their potential to do harm. I can't think of any other hobby where for small amounts of cash a person can buy wild fish from location X and feel free to release them at location Y.>
Anyway, I'll stop before this turns into a novel.
Cheers!
Amanda
<Cheers, Neale.>