This is a rather new species to aquarists. The first stock arrived at
"Aquarium Hamburg" 1956/57 (?) from Rio de Janeiro, caught by Griem near Capo Frio,
which is the cape east of Rio de Janeiro. Later, new stocks from the same place
came into the USA, but in my opinion the first USA stock were raised in Hamburg.
The species was discovered by General Th. D. White (US Air Force) also near Capo
Frio. It was described by G. S. Myers in 1942 and named for the finder. My stock
came in as eggs from Jack (Scheidnass) summer 1958. This species was also described
by Dr. W. Ladiges as "Pterolebias elegans" 1958 and this name is still in use among
aquarists.
The first look shows us a Cynolebias which looks like a Betta splendens
in the high development of the dorsal and in particular the anal fin. Male grows
up to 7 cm., but females always are shorter, normally not above 5 cm. The ground
coloring in lighted tanks is a pale olive with reddish tint in the male, in particular
in the dorsal and anal fin. Sometimes you may find some irregular dark areas distributed
over the body, more rarely the fins, of the male. In darker tanks the male is much
darker and the ground color changes to blackish green, but still with that reddish tint.
The sides of the males do not shine as in the "nigripinnis" and in particular the
"bellottii." Only the caudal fin has many brilliant bluish green spots. Males have
no markings or vertical bars on body, only at the lower edge of the anal fin there
may be a handsome, broad orange in most males. The photos in "Tropical Fish Hobbyist"
Sep. 58 show a young male which has not already got the full development of anal and
dorsal fins. The picture in DATZ Mar. 58 shows a bigger male, but also this male
possibly has not finished the development of the fins. The female has one or more
big and very conspicuous blackish spots in the sideline just above the ventral fins
and one or more blackish spots at the root of caudal. She also has some faint
greenish crossbars on the sides.
The species is only caught in the coastal lowlands near Capo Frio in the
State of Rio de Janeiro. In the "TFH Sep. 58" the Brazilian zoologist Antenor L.
de Carvalho (Rio de Janeiro) gives a very interesting picture of the place where
he collected the "whitei". He also gives some important facts about the breeding
etc. "During the months of October 1955 he searched along the Amaral Peizoto Highway
for the pool in which General Thomas D. White found the fish Myers named in his honor,
Cynolebias whitei. It was difficult to find the particular pool because there are
hundreds of pools along this highway, each fitting the description for the habitat of
Cynolebias whitei. Finally he found the few pools that contain Cynolebias whitei (at
the end of the month of October) located close to Sao Pedro da Aldeia, State of Rio de
Janeiro. At this time of the year the particular pool from which I selected the
specimens of Cynolebias whitei was about 25 feet in diameter and about 2 feet deep
in the center. The shape of the pool was almost circular and the water was muddy
brown in color. By taste I could notice a trace of salt, so I assume that the water
was slightly brackish. On the bottom of the pool was 10 inches of fine black mud,
with a texture as soft as body powder. There was no vegetation in the pool at all
except for a few water lilies in the center and some grass about the edges of the
pool. We were able to use a seine in this pool and we captured Cynolebias whitei,
Callichthys callichthys and some Poecilia vivipara... Many more females, than males
in the pool. All females were filled with eggs and all specimens were adults. The
Jan. 59 issue of the same magazine gives (Axelrod) further information: ...majority
of tank raised "whitei" are females...
The mean annual temperature in this area is 23 C, the coldest month is July
which was only 20 C and the warmest months are January-February with the mean temperature
of 25 C. The extremes are 10 C and 37 C. The shallow water and the shadeless surroundings
may give rise to high temperatures in the pools at midday and much lower temperatures
during night. The annual rainfall is 1100 mm, with most rain in the months from Nov.
to May. Driest month is Sept. with "only" 45 mm.
My stock of "whitei" were very quickly growing at temperatures about 22 C and
after only 1 to 1.5 months they mature if plenty of food is offered. Compared with
"nigripinnis" they are rather peaceful fishes. Males establish something like the
usual "pecking order" among killies and the smaller ones avoid the bigger ones that
do not chase the smaller ones. My big males, which were kept with each 4-5 females
were also very peaceful to the females and no fish had bitten fins. My males were much
shyer than my females, which never hid themselves. The stock took all food offered,
also lots of dry food, even when there were plenty of daphnia in their tanks. They eat
lots of food and the spawnings are plentiful. There were no disease problems and not a
single one died. They were kept in the normal killie water (300 ppm of NaCl, peat on bottom,
slightly acid to neutral reaction).
Carvalho described the spawning act in tanks. "First the male swims close to the
bottom, inspecting it carefully. The female follows closely behind him. From time to
time the male stops suddenly and makes a peculiar rapid up-and-down movement with his
body just as though he was shaking his head. Then he proceeds with the inspection. The
female follows closely by during all this time. Sometimes she is on his left and at
other times on his right side. I have even seen her take a nip at his anal fin. When
they find the right spot, the male puts his head in an oblique position, about 30 degrees
from vertical, head down. Then a very interesting thing happens: the female comes close
to the male and puts her head between his body and pectoral fins, resting her mouth against
the base of his pectoral fin. Then, with a rapid synchronized movement, the male flicks
his tail and the pair penetrated deep into the sediment. Immediately after diving both
laid down in the interior of the sediment, and with a rotating motion the male pushes
the female completely into the mud so that she disappears from view. This position is
maintained for 3 or 4 seconds after which they return to a normal position and begin
to look for a place to deposit another egg. As the pair emerges from their spawning
site, the gravel falls back over the hole in which they spawned and completely covers
the egg which was pushed deep into the sand...
The egg is a little smaller than the eggs of "nigripinnis" and "bellottii"
(Carvalho measured 1.25 mm) and 1.25 - 1.35 mm in diameter. They resemble "nigripinnis"
and "bellotttii" in the surface pattern of the membrane. Carvalho described this
pattern like this: The membrane is covered with tubercles of two distinct sizes.
The smaller tubercles are located evenly between the larger ones. Carvalho also
found that the male would not dive unless the female assumed the position with her
head between the pectoral fin and the body of the male. The pectoral fins of the
males have certain peculiarities on the inside face. Counting from top to bottom,
the first 8 rays of the pectoral fin of the male are provided with special tactile
papillae which indicate to the male that the female is in position and he can begin
his dive. The membrane of the egg adheres pieces of peat, but when you wash out
eggs from coarse peat you always will find eggs with very little peat on the membrane.
This is possibly because the adhering power decreases soon after spawning. On shallow
water without any peat, the eggs show big embryos with pigmentation and blood-circulation
after 3-4 weeks at 23-26 C. Only very few "resting eggs," in some broods there are none.
Here are the data of the eggs I got from Jack. He had the pair end of June 58.
First spawning from 25 June to 07 July, arrived here 14 Aug. After 24 hours I lifted out 8-9
fry. No belly-slides. A few more hatched the next day.
On 29 Aug. I thought I was able to sex them. Later on they matured to 5 males and 15 females. The peat was
re-dried on 16 Aug.
Second watering on 16 Sep. gave another 5 fry.
On 12 Oct. I took out my first spawning of the young fishes.