Video of altums spawning in captivity

[bossteck]

Here's a video I came across. Not sure if it have been posted.
Someone in China successfully got P. altums to spawn in captivity.

Very exciting indeed.

Video of spawning
YouTube- ??????????

Video of frys at 20 days.
YouTube- 20??????F1

[Fingerling]

Inspirational! Thanks for sharing.

[Shadow]

cool video

[barmby]

What can i say.. speechless. thanks for sharing.

[apistomaster]

Very interesting. They aren't a species that has been spawned successfully many times but I do suspect they may be from the "domestic" Altums bred in the Czech Republic.
I will share this with the Altum specialists on www.finarama.com forum.
One of our moderators living in the Czech republic has been relaying progress being made by breeders there with P. altums.

[bossteck]

Any photos and tips to help us differentiate wild from domesticated P. altums?

[Cardinals_Pride]

Amazing video. Thanks for sharing.

[stormhawk]

There was a much older breeding report on P. altum by a Japanese hobbyist named Hiroshi Azuma I think. It was published in TFH magazine many years ago.

Congratulations to the breeder in China as well. Thanks for sharing bossteck.

[bossteck]

Thanks for the information. Did some googling, it is in the June 1994 magazine. I am going to hunt that down

[stormhawk]

You're welcome. I have the article somewhere but I don't know where I placed my folder with all the clippings I received from friends in the past. The 1994 June issue might still be in stock with the publisher, or you can try and purchase from second hand stores online.

[bossteck]

I will try asking around if there's a back issue, if not, I will hound you to dig out yours

[stormhawk]

Hehehe no need for me to do that. You can order the specific article in digital format, probably in PDF here:

http://www.tfhmagazine.com/subscript...ssue--article/

The site doesn't state if they still have that particular 1994 issue though, so asking them would be advisable. Likewise, if you're into Angelfish, try asking for this particular article on Pterophyllum dumerilii aka leopoldi. That one was published in the 1990's as well and should probably be available in PDF format. I have it somewhere, but as with all my other files, I misplaced it somewhere in my messy room.

[bossteck]

Thanks for the lead Stormhawk!

[SCOPE]

Great to see the altum breeding in action!

i guess soon we will see more breeding of this angel even in SG.
In Taiwan, they had even published a Chinese book on how to breed the Altum angels. With more people sharing their secrets, i am sure we can see more breeding soon.

[Heiko Bleher]

Hi guys,
this is Heiko Bleher anf I just returned from another successfull expedition (colelcting an amazing hill stream loach in the Himalaya foothills) and see this thread.

I really wonder if one day we will have a good understanding of the real P. altum and what it is. I gave a talk in the Czech Republic in September and showed them that P. altum has NEVER been spawn successfully (the only time all baboes died, that was in Canada in 1992, by chance) and that the fish they claim to be P. altum is P. scalare from the Rio negro.

The very same is shown on this video, it is the fish spawned by Linke, by japanease, by Czechs and Germans, etc. and all are 100% sure that they spawned P. altum, which they never have.

I collected the real P. altum and introduced them into the hobby for the first time begin of the 1970s and I went back several times to the upper Orinoco to colelct it and imported it over decades inro Frankfurt germany for my company Aquariums Rio (see Bleher's Discus volume 1). Last December I went again to demonstrate to the world WHAT and HOW the real P. altums looks like and soon we will place extensive informations, photos and films on our website of this majestic and unique angelfish.

Until then, forget all what you see and read about "Spawing Pterophyllum altum" as no one has. This fish is so unique, so different, that one can see from afar howw differnet it is...

best regards

Heiko Bleher
www.aquapress-bleher.com

[stormhawk]

I am fairly certain that Azuma did breed the real altum. It is fairly possible as well, that someone somewhere has bred true altums in captivity, apart from the Canadian spawning. You cannot be fully certain that no one has done so successfully, and raised any resulting fry to adulthood.

If you can, please post pictures of the true altum you collected back in the 1970s as well, or if it's on your site, a link would be great too.

[bossteck]

Heiko,

Kindly update the community when information and photos of true P. altums are made available. I am sure many of us are looking forward to seeing them.

Thank you.

[Heiko Bleher]

Hi Stormhawk,

all I can tell you, that every single picture, films and the fiushes I have seen around the world – all which claim that this is the true P. altum - are not. Every single reference so far given was NOT the P. altum Pellegrin, 1904. If you show me a new one (not to be found on YouTube nor in the worldwide web so far), then I am very happy to look into it.

With Schmidt-Focke we tried for 30 years to breed it...

Unfortunately I did not make any photos in the late 1960s and 1970s (that is also why I went back last year, to photograh all my collecting spoys and to do more reserach). I did not have the money for expensive equipment at the time anf there were no digitals, only analogue. And all I was after was the fishes, the species, the variants to introduce them into the hobby.

Take care,

Heiko
www.aquapress-bleher.com

[stormhawk]

With Schmidt-Focke we tried for 30 years to breed it...

Hello again Heiko. Don't get me wrong, you do have personal experiences in collecting fish from the wild, but even if you and Dr Schmidt-Focke tried 30 years to breed it without success, it doesn't mean others had the same unsuccessful results as well. One can have success with a certain fish, yet someone else can't breed the same fish no matter how they try.

I can't find my copy of the 1994 article by Hiroshi Azuma in TFH magazine on his "altum" breeding account, but I am fairly certain they are not scalare.

Here's a breeding account based on wild-caught fish by some Scandinavian collectors:
http://www.finarama.com/tba/chronicles/fornback.htm

So, are those scalare in your opinion as well then? They collected it from the wild in the Rio Atabapo.

[Heiko Bleher]

Hi,

I really have no time, just of curtesy I answer, but believe me, you believe what you want to believe, I really do not care.

Just for your final information, and do not write to me anymore about this subject (P. altum) as you do not seem to want to understand what I write (just what you think). Just for the correction:
1. I never said that no one has bred them, I just said that from ALL I have seen, (in films, photos, and at breeders from Japan to Czech, from Germany to Australia) NONE is P. altum, which was bred (except for the ones in Canada).
2. The finrama report was written by Alf Stahlsberg, which I know very well and I have asked him already about it, and he confirmed that those he collected ALL died, and those bred later were fishes he received from some one named as P. altum - which were not P. altum, but P. scalare -, but he never corrected that in the article.

So much, good night

Heiko Bleher
www.aquapress-bleher.com