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Reprinted
with permission from:
Dr. Joanne Norton
Freshwater And Marine Aquarium
magazine
Clown Angelfish
Photos and Text
by Dr. Joanne Norton
FAMA: May 1983, Vol. 6, #5
The Clown angelfish has large black
spots and
blotches on a light-colored body.
Clown Angelfish
My seven 1982 FAMA
articles on angelfish genetics covered
the mutant genes that are present in
today's commercially-bred angelfish.
Combinations of two mutant genes also
were discussed and illustrated.
Some phenotypes have
been named, such as black lace, black,
marble, ghost, blushing, smokey,
chocolate, gold, zebra, zebra lace,
blue, butterfly and cobra. Additional
phenotypes that are seen occasionally
are blushing marble, blushing smokey,
blushing chocolate, blushing new gold
(white), and several others that are
less distinctive, such as several
combinations with zebra. It is
understandable that no names have been
applied to the many phenotypes that
are not easily distinguishable from
others. In fact it is not uncommon to
encounter an angelfish that must be
tested genetically, by appropriate
crosses, to discover its complete
genotype, even though it is usually
possible to discern part of its
genotype from its appearance.
A distinctive
angelfish that has not been named is
one for which I propose the name
"clown" angelfish, the subject of this
article. This fish, having a bold and
striking blotched pattern on the body,
is actually a modified zebra lace,
either with, or without, a single dose
of stripeless. Its fins are like the
fins of a zebra lace. The front of the
adult's body is speckled with black
dots and its ventral fins are
horizontally banded with light and
dark.
Fig. 1: Zebra Lace. This commonly seen
type has three
straight vertical stripes on the body.
Over the years I had
noticed that the zebra lace (having
zebra plus one dose of dark) angelfish
may produce offspring in which all of
the zebra lace individuals have three
straight, uniform, dark, vertical body
stripes (Fig. 1 above).
Occasionally I saw zebra lace with
crooked or broken body stripes, but I
did not have records of their
parentage. More recently, Bill Lutz
found, and gave me some zebra lace
with irregular markings instead of
three stripes on the body. I raised
these to maturity and kept one pair.
These were tested by crossing each
with wild-type (silver). The female
produced 267, all either zebra or
zebra lace. The male (Fig. 2 below)
produced 330, all either zebra or
zebra lace. Thus, both of these zebra
lace with irregular markings were
homozygous (double-dose) for zebra,
and heterozygous (single-dose) for
dark. All of the offspring had
irregular markings, varying from
slightly irregular or broken three
stripes to blotched, with little or no
striped pattern, in some of the zebra
lace. Since all of the irregulary-marked
offspring were heterozygous
(single-dose) zebras, I concluded that
irregular marking in zebra lace is not
a result of homozygous, rather than
heterozygous, zebra.
Fig. 2: Clown male, a zebra lace with
irregular markings.
Although every one
of the offspring of irregular zebra
lace x wild-type (silver) had
irregular markings, none of the zebras
had as bizarre markings as the most
blotched of the zebra lace. The zebras
all had vertical stripes, sometimes
broken and sometimes with one or more
partial stripes. While many of the
zebra lace had irregular stripes like
the zebras, some had very interesting
blotches and spots. Those that had the
most blotches and the least striping
were saved for future breeders,
examples of which are illustrated in
Figs. 3-7. These will be bred
brother to sister to find out whether
the percent of blotched offspring can
be increased in that way.
Fig. 3: Clown, from silver female x
clown male in Fig. 2.
Fig. 4: Clown, from silver female x
clown male in Fig. 2.
The problem in
trying to produce clown angelfish from
parents like I used, crossed with
silver, is that many of their
offspring have uneven stripes instead
of large blotches. Those with uneven
stripes are too similar to zebra lace
to deserve being called clown
angelfish. This problem was solved,
rather by accident, by Bill Lutz, who
had kept some irregularly-marked zebra
lace when he gave me some. In an
attempt to eventually produce some
"purple" angelfish (blushing black),
Mr. Lutz first crossed a zebra lace
female, which happened to be one with
irregular markings, with a blushing
male. Some of the offspring from this
cross were zebra butterfly (one dose
each of zebra, dark and stripeless),
which I discussed, along with
butterfly, in
Part Four (August, 1982) of my
angelfish genetics series.
Fig. 5: Clown, from silver female x
clown male in Fig. 2
Fig. 6: Clown from silver female x
clown male in Fig. 2.
Fig. 7: Clown, from silver female x
clown male in Fig. 2.
Fig. 8: Butterfly zebra (one dose of
dark, stripeless and zebra).
One parent was a zebra with uniform
stripes, as in Fig. 1.
I had found that
adding zebra to butterfly increases
the number of dark blotches on the
body. Butterfly has one or sometimes
two or three dark blotches, while
zebra butterfly (Fig. 8) has
additional dark blotches. The
interesting and useful outcome of the
cross by Mr. Lutz was not that he got
some zebra butterflys, which were
expected, but that every one of these
had more dark blotches on the body
than any zebra butterflys that I had
seen. In fact, his zebra butterflys
were so hightly blotched (Fig. 9) that
most of them appeared
indistinguishable from blotched zebra
lace. Although the genetics of the
irregularly-marked zebra lace and the
highly-blotched zebra butterfly has
not been investigated, it appears to
be a possibility that the genetic
modification that causes irregular
markings in zebra lace may also be
responsible for increased blotching in
zebra butterfly.
Fig. 9: Clown (one dose each of dark,
stripeless and zebra).
One parent was a zebra lace with
irregular markings, as in Fig. 2.
A clown angelfish is
either a zebra lace or zebra butterfly
that is genetically modified,
resulting in large blotches on the
body. The best method of producing
clown angelfish, at least until more
is known, probably is to cross a clown
angelfish with a blushing. You will
not get all clown offspring, but you
also will get no striped individuals.
If you happen to have a clown parent
like one of my original pair (one dose
of dark and two doses of zebra), you
may get about 50% clown offspring
because all of the offspring will
receive one dose of zebra and one dose
of stripeless, and half of them will
receive one dose of dark. If your
clown parent happens to be like the
type produced by Mr. Lutz (one dose
each of dark, zebra and stripeless),
you will get more types of offspring,
including blushing. I would not breed
clown to clown for commercial
production, because this mating will
produce some offspring without the
gene for stripeless, and these could
be striped instead of blotched.
At this point, the
unknown in breeding clown angelfish is
the genetics of the irregular marking.
If, for example, a single recessive
modifier is involved, you would get no
clown angelfish from the above two
crosses if the blushing parent does
not carry the recessive gene. If a
single dominant modifier is needed to
get the clown pattern, then your
chances are better for these two
crosses. If you get no clowns from
clown x blushing, then I would cross
the offspring having zebra and dark
(either zebra lace or zebra butterfly)
back with clown. I hope that the
genetics of the modifier(s) will be
worked out so that exact instructions
for breeding clown angelfish will be
possible.
The fact that every
clown angelfish differs from every
other clown, like fingerprints, adds
to the excitement of keeping and
raising this angelfish type. Even
though the clown angelfish is not
true-breeding, and will not be, it is
striking and different enough to be an
important addition for the commercial
and amateur angelfish breeder.
Black Velvet Angelfish
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