Any Rasbora Fans Out There?

Hi,

Just joined the forum recently and checking out the species specific forums.  I see the last post to this rasbora forum was over a year ago.  So I guess I'm shouting out to an empty room, "is anybody there"?

I am interested in this forum because I love rasboras, and really most cyprinids.  I have 8 purple harlequin rasboras, 12 long finned white cloud mountain minnows, and 20 "mini blue neon rasboras" as they used to be called.  However research has shown them to be neither a rasbora nor a danio, and they now have their own genus "sundadanio".  The most well known is the sundadanio axelrodi, which is listed on the Community Creator, but mine are "sundadanio globinis", and they have a beautiful neon blue streak down their backs.  They lose their color if stressed (like a tank move), same as with the purple harlequins.  The PC's got their color back in two hours after I brought them home, once they figured out they liked their new home.  But the sundadanios took nearly a week to restore their color.  Shy little guys with great big car-headlight eyes.  They are so c-u-t-e. 

So give us a shout out if anyone's still active on this rasbora forum

David

I once had some S. axelrodi. I'd never seen them before so when I saw them in one shop I had to buy a shoal. They did well in my 60 litre for quite a while then they suddenly all died within the space of a week. With hindsight, my water parameters aren't quite right for them (my pH is too high and my hardness right on their upper limit) 



I now have Trigonostigma espei and the are lovely fish. They were mislabelled in the shop - for ages I thought I had T. hengeli but as they matured it became obvious they are actually espei.

Love these guys though never kept them myself... Do you find them tricky to feed?

Have you ever kept green neon tetras?

I'm full of questions today!... what's the difference between a tetra and a rasbora? Locality or more?

...what's the difference between a tetra and a rasbora? Locality or more?

Locality. Rasboras evolved in Asia and are Cyprinids. Tetras evolved in Africa and America and are Characins.

From the title I thought this was going to be about Rasboras. Oh well. More interested in Rasboras than Danios. I’ve considered keeping Sundadanio a few times, but never actually done it. They save their best colours for blackwater, which is usually what puts me off.... although yours look very colourful.

Well, again, they are neither rasboras NOR danios.  Most people still call them rasboras.  The stores call them "miniature neon blue rasboras".  Indeed they act and look like rasboras.  So you *would* like them. 

The picture I posted is off the Internet; I don't have any pix of mine yet.  Mine actually look better than that. I agree with you about the blackwater.  I wanted to create the native condition so I put catama leaves and driftwood in.  Boy, did the water get brown!  I couldn't see their colors.  They seemed very happy in regular water at the store, so I took the leaves and driftwood out and now they're beautiful.  They seem fine without it.  Seems the main thing is soft, low PH water, and plenty of covered for hiding when stressed.  The blackwater, I'm guessing, is really optional.  At least I hope so.

Hello 

I'm a rasbora fan, but probably post more under "Fish Health" or "Thinkfish Daily News" than under the specific species sub-forum.

I had originally intended to buy ember tetras but ultimately chose harlequin rasboras because I was particularly attracted to their shoaling nature in the LFS.  I also adore their patterning which is much more visually attractive than single-coloured fish, plus the golden rim round their eye which makes it particularly good for eye contact with each fish.

I had a shoal of 6 harlequin rasboras but am now down to 4 of them - they're 4.25 years of age, and I was starting to prepare myself for "the inevitable" happening over the course of the next year as the usual life expectancy is 5, but have since been heartened to learn that there's a 12-year-old harlequin living in the UK and am hoping perhaps over-optimistically that mine might do the same... there's one that certainly looks perkier than the other 3 and she's the most quirky of them so I'm keeping my fingers crossed for her.

I also have neon green rasboras.  While the harlequins' patterning and eye-rim is attractive, (and my x-ray tetras' fin colouring is attractive,) I like the neon green rasboras for their activity levels - possibly more active because they're juvenile - but I definitely wouldn't describe them as neon green but more an identical colour to the plant hornwort (as I learned to my detriment - I think one got caught in it when I removed it for a water change).  Unfortunately, my neon greens haven't fared very well - I've only one left from the original shoal of 8, and 3 left from the subsequent shoal of 4 - and I'm not confident they will reach their life expectancy of 5 years (there's only one that might - a comparatively robust-looking female who seems to be in charge of the shoal and often commands control of the entire tank).  The neon green rasboras are fairly common in the UK now (via MA stores) - but maybe not where you're from.

I do love chilli rasboras - but would be careful to buy them as some of my neon greens took a great liking to squeezing themselves behind the filter and the chilli rasboras look like they might be more skilled in that respect by virtue of their dimunitive size!

Maidenhead Aquatics sells them as green tetras.

How bizarre that they sell them as 'tetras'. Incidentally, is that recent? I got the impression that all the MAs were using standard data on their labels now for names, etc, taken from their website e.g. https://www.fishkeeper.co.uk/help-and-advice/freshwater/cyprinids/neon-green-rasbora- but I may be wrong.

I confess it's a while since I was in an MA so they may have changed their labelling. It was the one that burned down that used to call them green tetras.

Microdevario kubotai aren’t rare., in fact they’re very common.

This is in the UK, though, and dwindstr lives in the USA (see https://forums.thinkfish.co.uk/fish-medicines/medicines-for-treating-different-conditions/msg45568/?topicseen#new thread) which may be completely different in terms of availability of fish. 

@fcmf I didn’t realise that.

But I wonder why they’re rare in the US? They’re farmed in the Far East. Constantly available...

It's a big country!  Perhaps they are more available, for example, on the East Coast.  The LFS's in my area don't see them often.  It's all about local distribution I guess.  The most likely place to have them is my favorite fish store in Oregon.  I drive up to Portland frequently (over an hour drive one way) as a source of fish I can't get elsewhere.  They have an entire row of nothing but corydoras, for example, about 20 different species at any one time.  https://www.wetspottropicalfish.com/
If you use the "FISH" drop down box, you can see all the animals they currently have.  And yes, I have indeed seen the kubatai there.