Between adult blues, queens, and hybrids there are many indicators in the difference... all are color based... there are no meristical differences in these species that are able to be used in telling them apart... as juveniles there are much fewer indicators than in adults...
Despite full queens being relatively rare in florida compared to blues, wueen genes can be found in many of these fish... the hybrids are obviously fertile so you get many fish that have just traces of queen blood... The obvious 50/50 townsend's are not nearly as common as the plethora of fish that appear to be blue angels but have traces of queen in them... like the fish in this thread...
The crown looks like it will stay on this fish, but in subadult fish some of the crown you see is remnant juvenile coloration... not an adult queen crown... true blues will only have a blue streak... not a crown... and any black in the crown shows queen genetics...
The true giveaway that this fish is a hybrid is the base of the pectoral fin (good job Peter)... true blues will not show a circle and will not have black at the base of the pectoral fin...
has anyone ever heard of a "golden-morphed queen"?
ive done google searching for a couple hour on different large angels
http://www.brasilmergulho.com/port/biologia/documentos/Variacoes_cromaticas_populacao.pdf
the link is in english and show different color morphs or inbreeding angels in the wild
This is a well-known population of queen angels at St. Paul's Rocks off of the coast of Brazil... queens are very common there, and it is just 4 acres with little recruitment from the mainland of Brazil... thus the inbreeding... the regular population of queen angels on the coast of Brazil is much more yellow than the Caribbean population, and the yellow morph is the most common morph found at St. Paul's Rocks... whatever the color you could always tell a St. Paul's specimen from the shorter dorsal and anal filaments... and these are all full queen as blue angels do not range anywhere near Brazil... There are yellow morphed fish elsewhere though... and speaking of the hybrid this is a yellow morphed Townsend I have...
If that crown is the deciding factor, from what I'm gathering, I'm starting to think finding a pure blue is the rarity, not the hybrid
I thought this picture I found is interesting...note the lack of crown (only a blue smudge) even though juvi stripe remnants are still visible.
http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/fish/gallery/photoout.asp?id=5607
HUGE adult:
http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/fish/gallery/photoout.asp?id=6733
And so what would this be, slight hybrid als, because there is some black in the crown?
http://www.aquariumzone.jp/fish/blueenzeru_02.jpg
Mine from 20+ years ago...apparently also a hybrid... I thought it was a blue the whole time...
Finding a pure blue is not the rarity... but numbers in South Florida were studied and there were areas where the hybrids made up nearly 10%... At inshore channels there are next to no queens found... blues dominate almost everywhere in Florida expect the reef tops off shore, where queens do... it is generally believed that blues evolved along the shorelines and queens at offshore reefs... recently in areas like Florida the two populations have mixed back together...
Peter, your old fish, and the one you show with black in the crown... is indeed the hybrid...
Copps
, but they are common for us Floridians or anyone getting fish from Florida.
