Cold water fish options

M

MRTom

New Member
Pygmy sunfish and olympic mudminnow are both native. Actually mudminnow is our only endemic fish! :D We should have a thread on these sometime... if only to dream... who knows, we may kick off a conservation effort someday!

Now... back to the topic, keep sending fish recommendations :)
 
PokeSephiroth

PokeSephiroth

Member
Really? Huh.... I'm curious where you could go and catch some native species... hmm I mean, which lakes/water ways...

Back to the topic:
I've always thought that Rosy Barbs were considered subtropical fish.
Puntius semifasciolatus - Gold Barbs
 
M

MRTom

New Member
Panda garras FTW! Apparently there is also rasbora rasbora which is sympatric to it... great diving point for more research!

And gold barbs are a great one, I wonder if the truly golden aquarium bred variety is still cold water resistant!
 
T

tayntdawg

New Member
This is way cool man. I allways wanted to do PNW Puget sound saltwater tank with a badass octopus and a mora eel. Thanks for the idea and the cooler water fish.
 
dwarfpike

dwarfpike

Well-Known Member
MRTom said:
And gold barbs are a great one, I wonder if the truly golden aquarium bred variety is still cold water resistant!
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Sadly I've never seen the wild form for sale, it's very pretty.

Noble Gourami (Ctenops nobilis - think a larger, elongated chocolate gourami) and paradise fish both come to mind, especially the ones taht used to be called M. chinensis.
 
K

KaraWolf

Member
excuse me while I steal that Pygmy sunfish idea tooo cute!! Plus I found a study on their life cycle that includes a breeding project :p
In the meantime, danio erythromicron 73-78. Which is tiny and has pink and green stripes :D but is called emeraldgreen lol
Another is devario pathirana at 68-75 the barred danio
 
M

MRTom

New Member
KaraWolf said:
excuse me while I steal that Pygmy sunfish idea tooo cute!! Plus I found a study on their life cycle that includes a breeding project :p
In the meantime, danio erythromicron 73-78. Which is tiny and has pink and green stripes :Dbut is called emeraldgreen lol
Another is devario pathirana at 68-75 the barred danio
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Ooh please share that link to the study if you can!

And thanks for pointing out devario pathirana! Love spotted fish! Where did you get the temps for these guys? SF lists 73F and fishbase lists 71. I am thinking of creating a lukewarm temperature list for tanks I will setup in the high parts of my room! I'm thinking 3 or 4 layers of tanks, at decreasing temps as you go down... something like 74->68->62 :D
 
M

MRTom

New Member
YES!!! What a geekout! :study: 

All reproductive studies were conducted in the laboratory. The fishes were contained in four 40-liter and six 20-liter all-glass aquaria. Continuous air was supplied by aquarium pumps and air stones. Water temperature was controlled within 3°C by tube-type aquarium heaters with internal thermostats. A 15.5 hour light period was maintained throughout the study using daylight supplemented with fluorescent light banks on an automatic timer. Because elassomid fishes will not readily eat dry foods, they were fed live brine shrimp (Artemia) nauplii either daily or every second day, depending upon their size and breeding condition.

In order to duplicate their natural environment as closely as possible, aquatic plants, principally of the genus Ceratophyllum, were collected with breeding stocks of elassomid fishes and used in the spawning aquaria. Specimens were transported from the field to the lab in Styrofoam boxes and then placed into a 40-liter aquarium filled with 21°C distilled water. After a period of 7-10 days, five or six mature females were transferred into each of two 20-liter aquaria with physical conditions similar to those of the holding tank. Using aquarium heaters, the water temperature in these two aquaria was gradually raised 2.5-4.5°C over a period of 10-14 days until the female abdomens began to enlarge, indicating egg production. This temperature was maintained for another 7-8 days, at which time one or two males of the same species were introduced into each tank with the females. After a period of 2-3 days, during which the males established territories, spawning usually occurred.

Within 10 minutes after spawning, the eggs were transferred into 50 ml petri dishes and maintained under similar physical conditions. Photographs of live eggs were taken of each embryological stage, upon which the accompanying composite illustrations were drawn.

The prolarvae were maintained in the same petri dishes until they reached a total length of 8-10 mm. At this time they were transferred into a 20-liter all-glass aquarium and allowed to grow to adult size. Periodically, specimens were preserved in a 5% formalin solution for later observation. Because of the small number of eggs produced by a single spawn, and the high mortality rates of eggs and larvae, several spawns were necessary in order to complete a series from newly hatched prolarvae to adult.
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Interestingly they kept them in pretty warm water to breed! :scratch: 
 
K

KaraWolf

Member
maybe to speed the spawning cycle? They were collected in SC/NC so maybe they were trying to duplicate the summer.
 
Livebearer

Livebearer

Member
Here are some more.
Heterandria formosa N. American native livebearer, 45o to 75o male 2cm, females, 3cm to 4cm
Daces; phoxinus oreas, temps14.5c to 25.3c, adults 40-55mm, distribution, VA. feeds on algee, insects, detritus matter.
Gobies, shiners
Norhtern minnow species (check each states regs!)
Cory's suggestion on Goodieds but not all can tolerate cool waters over winter and are HARD to find and are threatened in some way, so Join the A.L.A.!
Gambusia species (holbrookie, affins are regulated in Wa. State) Yes Cory I have the invasive species list in hand!
Green sunfish, fun when small and great for the frypan when grown! :cyclops:  :cyclops:
Chubs,
Black banded sunfish (small species good for a larger pond)
Blue spotted sunfish, 40mm to 70mm, distrabution VA. says good aquarium fish! 
some killfishes, just to name a few
Yellow bullhead (a smaller catfish/gamefish stocked here in WA.)
I have had an outdoor tub-pond going seasonally for 3 years and have kept;
Danios,
Gambusia
Guppies
minnows
Green sunfish
White clouds
Largemouth bass
Brown bullhead
Some of these I had a fishing license to obtain.
I would wait til' spring to pursue this venture and do a lot of research and search other states fish clubs for stock.
 
M

MRTom

New Member
I took everyone's recommendations and researched temps for as many of the fish as I could. I couldn't figure out the sunfish and a few other native or less common species. I made a pretty little spreadsheet to continue my research, but for the time being I thought I'd share the chart on temps I have so far. (Click to see full size. I'll add it to the top post too)



One fish of interest is the Panda Garra (Garra Flavatra) which SF lists at 72, but they acknowledge the temp was collected during the hot season. This fish may actually prefer lower temps. However, most other sites I found (PFK, greenpark, liveaquaria, aqua-fish and TFK) reference the same numbers without referring to the lower expected temps. I see a trip to the library to find the Kullander and Fang paper in my near future!
 
PokeSephiroth

PokeSephiroth

Member
I s'pose these haven't been mentioned yet, but what about Axolotls? I've read that their comfort zone can be around 60-64*F... they can go colder (some even claim that they keep them outside in ponds where the water ices over and still survive the winter season)... They can tolerate temps up to 74*F, but anything higher will stress them out.

Don't know if this really counts, since they aren't..."fish" per se, but they are becoming popular in the fish keeping hobby. Just thought I'd toss that in there.
 
M

MRTom

New Member
Nice toss! My focus so far has been on community fish, but there are already some non-community fish in there. Time to broaden the search!
 
PokeSephiroth

PokeSephiroth

Member
What about those Blind Cave Fish? They can live in water temps around 60*F up to 80*F.... :D

Blind Cave Fish aka Mexican Tetra
Scientific name: Astyanax fasciatus mexicanus
 
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