PlanetCatfish.com

Hi,

Found this in a local fish store tonight. What first caught my attention was the solid black, the size of the tail and that there was no hint to eyes at all.

My guess is that this is a common aneaus that lost it's eyes as a fry and thinks it is in the dark or against a very dark background. I saw a similar blind aneaus before, but it was clearly a very dark aneaus. This one is solid black except for its belly.

It is in motion all the time, almost like a gold fish. Very hard to take a picture of.

Thanks, you guys are fantastic!

From the body shape, I'd say more like this.

There is no brown at all in the fins. Except for the belly, this fish is solid black. What ever it is, it is the most active cory I have ever seen. Never stops moving.

cincy wrote:There is no brown at all in the fins. Except for the belly, this fish is solid black. What ever it is, it is the most active cory I have ever seen. Never stops moving.

It's the fish Silurus points out.

The colour of the fins changes with the condition of the fish. It's swimming around so much becuase it is blind, which may also explain the intense colour.

Oddly one of the ones I had a few years back lost both its eyes too.

Jools

There are my two almost solid black Megalechis sp. They are both blind. I've bought them as a 1 cm tiny black fishes and didn't realize that they had no eyes.




Sorry for algae and snail on the glass
all the best
Iwona

From the one view a distinctive body pattern is visible, I think it is C. nattereri, the body shape also matches for this species.
I also have a C. sterbai that was born without eyes and this also is almost totally black.

Ian

Coryman, do you think, that the dark colouration and blindness in these fish is just a coincidence? Or dark colour is caused by blindness, somethink like "night" adaptation, fish with no eyes "thinks" that it is a night? Or it is a kind of melanistic mutation, that causes abnormal eye development in embryo?

Iwona

Wow interesting topic and definitely an amazing fish!

loved when you said "thinks"

Just a follow up and blind and black corys...

About six months ago I ran across another blind and black cory. (not the one pictured above) He has since changed colors. While I could not see eyes before, he now has two tiny eyes and has turned a metalic green. He now looks like a brilliantly colored aeneus with tiny eyes. Fish are so fascinating!