Cocos Island lemonpeel and eibli hybrid pair.

[LemonLemon]

Here's a couple photos of a new dwarf angel added to my collection.

It's the Indian Ocean variant of the Lemonpeel Angelfish, Centropyge flavissimus.

What's so special/different from the regular lemonpeel?

Check out the eyes. Not only does it lack the blue eye ring, the entire iris of the eye is blue.

Pacific Ocean lemonpeels have brown irises and a blue ring around the eye.
Indian Ocean lemonpeels from christmas island and cocos island have blue irises and no blue eye ring.

This gives the appearance of a rather clueless- squinty eyed lemonpeel. I find it extremely cute and charming!

Only Indian ocean lemonpeels have this characteristic and it's a geographical variation, but some scientists believe that this divergence has caused the normal lemonpeel to slightly evolve and classify it as a different species.

enough words, here are some pics.

all pics taken using iphone4. Takes quite good photos right?

I seldom see these guys for sale in my country. so far i think only a few occasions. they come direct from cocos island with joculators and nothing else. usually only in onesies or twosies. this time there were 3 vs about 20 joculators. i took the smallest one.

 

[LemonLemon]

I intend to pair the cocos lemonpeel with my hybrid Eibli x vroliki.

I've already caught it out and placed it together with the lemonpeel in a separate system.

the two fishes, when spawned and fries raised, will produce the legendary tiger-pyge dwarf angel.

here's a few pics of my eibli x vroliki.

since eibli, vroliki and lemonpeel are all very closely related and in the same complex, mixing and pairing any of the three should not be too difficult.. i think.

of course i won't expect any rearing of said future fries (if any). this pairing is just purely for fun.

the eibli hybrid i've had for quite some time now. i usually shy away from eibli x vroliki hybrids because i don't find them too attractive, but this particular one i found was quite unique. i like the scrawled and scribbled design it dons.

 

[Luiz Rocha]

Oh fantastic, please keep me posted about those guys, I am writing a paper about their genetics at this very moment. I will report my findings here when the study is completed.

 

[LemonLemon]

Hi Luiz,

nice to hear that and i'm very excited on your findings. Do you think it's a different species? Allopatric perhaps?

It's been feeding well so far. i've always wanted to get one but i've never been able to find one of the right size. this one's a little over 2 inches.

 

[29reef]

Lemon is there any size difference between the two angels? You said the lemonpeel was the smaller brought in but I can't tell from the photos.

It will be a stunning pair if they decide to play nice.

 

[LemonLemon]

yes the lemonpeel is slightly over 2 inches.

the eibli is just shy of 3.

the difference really isn't that much though, but it is noticeable.

and the eibli hybrid is moderately aggressive at best.

 

[Luiz Rocha]

I can't tell much because results are still preliminary, but it is a lot more complicated than it being a different species... When we submit the paper to a journal I will work on a "popular" version of it with more understandable language.

 

[29reef]

Are they together already?

 

[LemonLemon]

Luiz - that's great. i'll be waiting for the easier-to-read version haha! what an interesting fish this is.

29reef - they aren't fighting, but i'm not exactly sure if they're together.

 

[reefjunkie42]

very nice fish.

 

[LemonLemon]

thanks reefjunkie.

the eibli hybrid is circling the lemonpeel. checking it out.

no super aggressive chasing as of yet. should not happen.

they should play nice soon.

 

[29reef]

I meant "together" in the same tank sense. Glad to hear they haven't gone at each other.

 

[humaguy]

very cool thread...very interested to follow this story...good luck!

 

[LemonLemon]

29reef - oh sorry i didn't know you meant that. yep they are together now and no majorrr problems. but the eibli hybrid is showing some dominance and the lemonpeel is just staying out of it's way for now.

humaguy - thanks! there's nothing much to follow though sadly the best i can ever get will be a successful pairing and spawning and then that's it. the eggs can't be bred. no one in my country has tried and bred dwarf angels yet.

 

[LemonLemon]

here's a photo of the indian ocean lemonpeel that luiz photographed in xmas islands.

he posted this photo in the thread labelled rarities under water and i hope he doesn't mind me borrowing it to show it here.

the eyes are actually very blue like this, but the photos i posted doesn't really capture the blue-ness.

 

[Bello]

Nice idea Lemon! Hope it works out! Good luck!

The Eibli hybrid by itself, is stunning..... drool

 

[Yurivd]

It is a really nice find

 

[LemonLemon]

bello - thanks! they're playing nice so far and the lemonpeel has adapted really well. i'll update with a few pictures soon.

yuri - yeah these guys are pretty uncommon here. the cocos island shipment only packs along two species. joculators and flavissimus. but almost always do they omit the flavissimus and just ship nothing but joculators. once in a while a few lemonpeels will be shipped along but always in small numbers.

while we can get as many as 20+ pieces of joculators per shipment, the number of lemonpeels shipped are always small. always less than 5.

i've seen them three times and have always admired but never bought any. this time i decided to get one and i'm really really loving this fish.

 

[LemonLemon]

It's now placed in a separate system temporarily. as you can see the tail has a little nip from the initial "introduction" with the eibli hybrid but everything's sorted out now and the lemonpeel is really settled in. it's eating pellets and flakes heartily which is nice to see.

i'm sorry that these two photos are of such embarrassing quality. especially with the amazing photo from luiz rocha only a few posts up ahead. and it's funny how the initial photos i've posted are so much better and both are taken using the same device/potato (yes my camera is temperamental)

but the two photos here show the blue iris much more clearly.

i also noticed something else. all the indian ocean lemonpeels have a black marking just behind the operculum. whereas the pacific lemonpeels do not. but then i did a google search, and it seems that some, albeit very few pacific ones also have the black marking. vroliki also have the black operculum markings and crosses between pacific lemonpeels and vroliki show the black marking.

now i'm confused and this seems a little more interesting. but i'm just observing all this from a hobbyist point of view and i hope to learn more about this when luiz finishes with his paper!

 

[Yurivd]

bello - thanks! they're playing nice so far and the lemonpeel has adapted really well. i'll update with a few pictures soon.

yuri - yeah these guys are pretty uncommon here. the cocos island shipment only packs along two species. joculators and flavissimus. but almost always do they omit the flavissimus and just ship nothing but joculators. once in a while a few lemonpeels will be shipped along but always in small numbers.

while we can get as many as 20+ pieces of joculators per shipment, the number of lemonpeels shipped are always small. always less than 5.

i've seen them three times and have always admired but never bought any. this time i decided to get one and i'm really really loving this fish.

The cocos collector also can do C. colini but he ask more for them than joculators