Smells Fishy
Member
No not realy, they are a small carp breed all have the same potential of growing full size. But they are captive bred for 1000nds of years unfortunately but obvuously also inbred for as many years, hence the monstroseties out there with telescope eyes etc. So a lot of the common ones also mutated into dwarfed versions and stay rather small. I already have them for many years and some keep growing and some of them stagnate in growth at a certain age.
It's the same with color, they all are born black (at east from above its black, from the side it's more greenish. That's the original natural color of the ancester. Some get orange, others get white, others again get spoted and others again stay plain original color. The breeders sellect these dark ones out you wont see them as pet goldfish in the LFS. But the breeders also feed special food to enhance color and accelerate growth. Commet tail versions even bought completely orange all have the potential to turn completely white while maturing when not fed special food.
There is absolute no saying what you finaly will get and how fast that will be, but you have a bit a hand in this as well with feeding naturaly.
In general consensus from breeders and LFS info, they say they grow to fast and too big.. Yes that is true with the super duper high protiene they feed, that's what they do, always did and obviously all they know and advocate. Very unatural food to accelerate and enhance this and that is common commercial practice and info.Feed a lot and buy a lot..
I have my own bred goldfish and feed them sparsely and rather naturaly and they all are still extremely healthy under 5 cm in 2 years time. They feed on plants, like duckweed, salvinia, elodea, froozen food and additionaly every few days a bit pellets.
That's all i can make of it. But because you never know what gene is most active, be prepared.. It's a gamble, i might got luky with breeding on a batch mutated to stay smaller for a longer time. You need an address to rehome them if it doesn't work out, beter safe than sory for the fish..
I love how this has turned into a kind of goldfish conversation. It's been a while since I talked this talk because I stopped using my goldfish forum a couple of years ago and only use this one now. I did think about suggesting a goldfish but didn't because sciencefiction has the tubs planted and my experience with goldfish vs plants has been a poor affair, I think we spoke about the vs before. Even the tough plants like Anubias and Amazon swords got roughed up by my fancys, but strangely in their current tank there's some salvinia auriculata which they havent touched.
Anyway it sounds like you've got a lot of experience with common goldfish. I once had a 5ft tank with a whole load of different coloured commons, black, yellow, orange and calico and it was the best tank I've ever had. Your right about goldfish being a special fish, kind of similar to how Oscar's get praise. It was great to watch the fish cruise the tank in single line one after the other following the leader, then break off and go their own way. Everybody that saw the tank loved it, probably helped the tank was massive but for me it was the fish. I ended up moving so I traded in all of them because I had 5 other tanks to contend with, didn't want the hassle. Wasn't long till I got my self a nice black moor which has turned into my all time favourite fish. You used the word "monstroseties" regarding telescopic eyes and since I have two fancys with these eyes, I took offence to how you view them. Maybe you've never seen a beautiful telescope fancy, checkout SolidGold goldfish on youtube, it will sway you. I can see where you're coming from because fancy goldfish are a frankenstein fish like no other, with bubble eyes and the other mad ones where the eyes look only upwards. To me breeding the telescope trait in goldfish is much more attractive and acceptable than breeding for a massive Kok in flowerhorns, there's even similar Kok thing going on with glass fish. Wouldn't a flowerhorn look so much better without the Kok? It all comes down to people playing god, getting there names etched into history, thinking they're great because they created something that was never before, it happens with plants as well. Crypt flamingo might be bright pink but it's not a monstrosity. It also comes down to taste and that in life there is no such thing as normal. Do I sound mad as in angry? It's more like ranting I hope. It's just I have one huge calico telescope called Blink and what makes her so special to me is that she has one eye! Basically I think she's a beautiful fish and she's not perfect (nothing can ever perfect in life). Best of all she has a story and to prove you wrong I'm going to take a picture tonight when the lights are on and add it here so you can tell me what you think. Sorry I just don't like people dissing my pet fish.