01/21/2004 Entry: "My poor new parrot fishies... :("

I picked these five beauties up yesterday, not realizing the sordid past involved. Many of you have probably heard of parrot fish -- these are "jelly bean" parrots, and it wasn't until doing some online searching that I learned just how cruel life's been to the little guys. First off, they're mutts. Their fascinating yet arguably unhealthy body shape and scheme is the result of crossbreeding, and what's even stranger? I can't find a site that positively identifies which two types of fish were crossbred. Apparently, it's like the Colonel's recipe or some shit. This has given the little mutants a wealth of problems -- their spines are abnormal, they can't chew food like most other fish, eyes are a bit fucked...so on and so on. That's just the half of it, though.

The fish are popular mainly because, as freshwater fish, they have alarmingly bright colors. Beautiful? Yes, but completely unnatural. During their albino adolescence, the fish are injected with dye-loaded needles, which literally spread the fluid colors through the parrots' bodies. Pretty sick, aye? And you thought GloFish were bad. The process invariably kills many of the fish, and the ones who survive potentially contract diseases from others by way of the dirty dye needles. Worse yet, the fish are charged with a terribly shortened lifespan. All that shit for a little extra color -- a color that will usually fade out in time. I had absolutely no idea about any of this when the fish were purchased, and while I'm not gonna pretend to be some big activist (I once ate alligator jerky), it's still kinda frigged up. Fish like these filter mainly filter here from Japan, and have been banned in a few other countries.

Four of the parrots came from the same store -- the fifth, called a "Christmas Parrot," came from another. I was taken with the last one because it was A) cheap, B) cute n' small, and C) off-white with green speckles. The lady working there told us that the fish "used to be red and green," citing how the parrots sometimes change colors. That's true, but not in this case -- it just lost its unnatural dye.

They're pretty fish, though. And they smile a lot. Must've blocked out the bad memories.

Chestnuts roasted by squee4242 @ 01/21/2004 08:04 PM EST

...pretty...ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh ahhhhhhhhhhh

Chestnuts roasted by Scourge @ 01/21/2004 08:10 PM EST

Buy yourself an Alf cake pan: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2373930461&category=25466

Chestnuts roasted by squee4242 @ 01/21/2004 08:20 PM EST

Matt, you can take solace in the fact that you're not the sickest person out there...I've been known to pass away a bored Saturday afternoon with a rod and reel in someone else's goldfish bowl. Catch and release, mind you...eating those little bastards went out with my great-grandmother's generation.

Chestnuts roasted by Monster Dog @ 01/21/2004 08:48 PM EST

I wonder how much longer it will be legal to buy these. Or is it?
Oh well, give them a nice home.

Chestnuts roasted by Andrew T. @ 01/21/2004 09:00 PM EST

Christmas fish and Halloween Pringles, we just can't let go of the holidays. Admit it: January through September is just an awful excuse for a vacation.

Wake me up when Garfield puts his pirate outfit back on.

Chestnuts roasted by Matt (#2?) @ 01/21/2004 09:16 PM EST

Poor dears! I know you shouldn't, but Matt, give more a home. It's like taking in stray dogs or cats. At least someone is giving them better care than they would likely recieve in a pet shop.

I've always wondered...Matt, how do all 1,000 of your cats take to having floting bits of what they probably consider brightly colored lunch around? Have they ever made a try for them?

Chestnuts roasted by starwenn @ 01/21/2004 09:18 PM EST

Poor little fishes :( I want to hug their tiny little horrendously manipulated bodies.

Chestnuts roasted by Evin @ 01/21/2004 09:24 PM EST

We had neon tetras ( I think) and the guy that sold them to us said that they were injected with dye at the beginning of their little life. He didn't say anything about it shortening their life span any though. 2 of them lasted a year, the third one died the first day we brought it home. It was gross at the end of the year, they had just turned a clear white. They were pretty when they were younger though, all bright pink, green and yellow.

Chestnuts roasted by Stacey @ 01/21/2004 10:21 PM EST

I bought a few of these a couple years back from Wally World.

The dye lasted a little over a year but the funked up thing is that after all the dye washed out the fish are now 90% clear. I can see thier brain, heart, spinal cord, stomic and intestines.

Its like having the reincarnation of that guy from the 80s who had the see through skin suit to teach you about proper diet* swmining around my tank.

*Anyone know who im talking about? He was on Nick early 80's IIRC.

Chestnuts roasted by Mr Mango @ 01/21/2004 10:27 PM EST

"The cold hard lands
they bites our hands,
they gnaws our feet.
The rocks and stones
are like old bones
all bare of meat.
But stream and pool
is wet and cool:
so nice for feet!
And now we wish -

Alive without breath;
as cold as death;
never thirsting, ever drinking
clad in mail, never clinking.
Drowns on dry land,
thinks an island
is a mountain;
thinks a fountain
is a puff of air.
So sleek, so fair!
What a joy to meet!
We only wish
to catch a fish,
so juicy-sweet!
"

:)

Seriously, I feel really bad for these fish. Stupid marketing people are going to destroy the world. And you KNOW it was the marketing people that came up with this idea.

Chestnuts roasted by Cameron @ 01/21/2004 10:42 PM EST

Those parrots are actually created by crossbreeding Red Devils with Severums. Both are cichlids with fairly shitty dispositions, though the sevrums get around a foot long. Just my two cents.

Chestnuts roasted by "Wild" Bill @ 01/21/2004 10:56 PM EST

I had a RD is one of our old tanks, and it lived up to its name. It was also the last fish to die, despite increasing indications by the tank's decayed condition that it should've died months before it did.

Course, now that we've got all these parrots, we're kinda limited in what we can add. I really wanted a shovelnose (think shark/catfish), but they're said to swallow basically anything in sight. Oh well.

Chestnuts roasted by Matt @ 01/21/2004 10:59 PM EST

Fish are friends, not food. Buy more and have a tank full of rainbow.

Chestnuts roasted by Killer Duck @ 01/21/2004 11:22 PM EST

Here it comes, the Former Aquarium Store guy's perspective.

Blood parrots (as we always knew them) are generally pretty gentle compared to their parents (Red Devils earn that name, Severums are just very territorial). I have known Parrots to live for 5-10 years. Long for a fish, short for a big cichlid. And these ones will never breed, because they're like mules--cross breeds are usually sterile.

As for neon tetras, if they're true Neons (or Cardinals--both have a red and a blue neon stripe on their body) those colours are 100% natural. The reason they don't live long is because they are very finnicky about water quality, and aren't forgiving if the water isn't to their liking.

On the other hand, there is another kind of Neon fish, usually called Painted Glass Fish. These ones are see through, about the size of a quarter (in stores). In the wild, they are just clear, and live in brackish zones. In stores, they are usually sold in freshwater (so they get a lot of disease) after being injected along their spinal columns. It's sick, plus it fades in about 4 weeks. On the other hand, if you are really into holidays, in recent years they started injecting them for various seasons(orange/black for Hallowe'en, red/green for Xmas, pastels for Easter). I hated those things--they were always getting sick.

What bothered me most was that these fish were so popular with people that other fish started getting the ink treatments--fruit loop/rasberry/blueberry tetras, bala sharks, rainbow sharks. When I was running the place, we stopped getting those fish in--most reputable dealers don't carry those anymore. Genetically altered fish aren't the same--no one stabbed them in the spine to add pretty colour.

But at least Matt can probably take care of the Parrots properly (although they do provide an wthical dilemna)..

Chestnuts roasted by Sean @ 01/22/2004 12:37 AM EST

Sean, check out the yellowish fish dead center in the pic above. That's one of the "holiday" editions you mentioned -- a Christmas Parrot. The dye's almost completely gone, save for a few green traces.

I've read that the color fade is pretty common: kinda makes you wonder if these pet stores bank on early deaths for the fish.

Oh well, on the bright side, they're all in a very clean 55 gallon tank with a brand new filter, so at least their future'll be better than their past.

Chestnuts roasted by Matt @ 01/22/2004 12:46 AM EST

Oh, and if you come back -- about a year ago we had a catfish (sold as a shark because it looked very much like one). In retrospect, I think it might've been dyed. I've never seen one of the faux sharks looks SO sharklike: this one was very, very silver with a single black streak, but the tipoff is that it had the same misshapen head common in parrots. Though big (7 inches, pretty thick), I couldn't help thinking it seemed a bit stunted. What's your take?

Chestnuts roasted by Matt @ 01/22/2004 12:48 AM EST

Matt, you should buy more of these fish, because think of all the people who will put them in crappy tanks and just let them die unhappily. :( I think you're a good pet owner from the kind of things you've said. Since they're not expensive I think it would be a kind thing to buy as many as can comfortably live in the tank.

Chestnuts roasted by GJ @ 01/22/2004 02:51 AM EST

Yeah, I just have a fishtank with cool skeletons and skeletal pirates. All airy bubbly. I like having an underwater horror scene. I have a few water plants to pretend the thing has a purpose beyond looking spooky. I just can't get past the whole fish die thing. I agree with d d dave. Thanks dave, never thought of the growing kind o' sealife that can be found in toys r us.
Oh, and what the hell is woot? Tragically unhip, apparently.

Chestnuts roasted by spooky @ 01/22/2004 03:46 AM EST

Wow...poor fish.

Does this sound like animal abuse to anyone else?

Chestnuts roasted by Paul @ 01/22/2004 06:22 AM EST

I've come to the conclusion that Matt should buy every single one of these fish, and let them live in his bathtub. Then, write a series of articles about the eventual fish society that will blossom. It'll be an awesome feature, and you'll get to feel like you're making a difference in the world by saving all these poor fishies from the life of pain and agony that they've endured for far too long.

Really, you'd be an asshole not to.

Chestnuts roasted by Evin @ 01/22/2004 06:26 AM EST

I don't know about buying them all up. Supply and demand. If Matt and others feel like giving these already screwed-up fish good homes, which I think is a good service, the producers may think "Hey, they're selling like hotcakes! Increase production!" This could be the advent to a crazy snowball effect in the mass fucked-up fish industry.

Chestnuts roasted by Nachokhaki @ 01/22/2004 07:48 AM EST

having an "abnormal spine" sounds so much worse than having a Bad Back. I remember in Jr. High having to do the scoliosis test and DREADING the idea that I might actually have it, because if I did that would mean that I would have to hang out with the retarded kids.

I was a run of the mill kid. not popular, not picked on. If i couldn't get cool, at least i didn't want to get pushed over while i was trying to buy a pepperoni pizza.

what does this have to do with fish? I don't know, I always had reptiles. Oh, I have since learned that calling people who are really retarded retarded is not cool. But calling people who are not really retarded but act retarded retarded is completely acceptable.

Chestnuts roasted by Chopstick Sensei @ 01/22/2004 09:06 AM EST

The fish look great! It will be a bummer when they start to fade away. You will have only pale misshapen gold fish. I am glad your giving them a good home, Matt.

You know, I would like a nice Japanese Coy pond one day.

Chestnuts roasted by Stilewalker @ 01/22/2004 09:06 AM EST

Hey Matt (hopefully you come back to read this), there are three possibilities. If it was really catfish-like, there are a couple that get sold as sharks. One is the Irridescent Shark, which does have the big head and googly eyes. They are kind of silver with blue stripes. The other catfish is the Blacktip Shark. These guys are all silver, but the fins are black. They also look catfish-like, but more sharky, too.

On the other hand, it could have been a Bala Shark (or Tricolour shark). These guys are all silver, with black and gold borders on their fins. Sometimes their heads are a little big for their body, but that's normal since they are actually minnows (like goldfish).

If it was a dyed Bala Shark, they are useually dyed red or blue.

In the case of all of these fish, any of them could be 7" plus. Irridescent Sharks get up to three feet long (you'd know it was one of these if it swam madly into the sides constantly); Blacktips get about 18-24, and Balas get 12-18.

Of course, that never happens in a home aquarium, but they can get pretty big there too.

Hope that helps.

Chestnuts roasted by Sean @ 01/22/2004 10:54 AM EST

matt, the shark you bought was an irriedscent shark. a catfish. they get 2 ft. long and swim alot. need about a 600 gallon tank as they are fast and very skittish (did your bash into the glass alot?). funny how petsmart sells them as infants and has a tag on them that says they get to like 10" or something. i have a 280 gallon tank in my living room and i couldn't even house one for life. and wild bill is correct on the blood parrot cross. they are very popular in asia, there is also a tail-less version that is more hideous than those ugly swimming balls you've got right there. here's a pic of my 19" black arowana for the hell of it:

http://predatoryfish.net/pics/narc/IM000073.JPG

and my blue motoro stingray (yes there are freshwater rays) and lapradei bichir:

http://predatoryfish.net/pics/narc/IM000071.JPG

Chestnuts roasted by nick @ 01/22/2004 11:16 AM EST

sorry sean, didn't know you had already posted on the irridescent shark thing.

Chestnuts roasted by nick @ 01/22/2004 11:21 AM EST

The guy at the pet store gave us some weird (and probably bullshit) story about the shark's origin, but having owned so many irid-sharks, this definitely wasn't a typical one. It may have been a bala -- I seem to recall hearing that word attached to it. He said they're only found in one lake or river on the other side of the world, if that helps.

The fish was also notable for having a strange swimming pattern: seemingly agitated, and not very fluid. When he went to the top for food, it wasn't graceful at all. He died rather suddenly despite being in a clean tank and appearing free from disease, so I was curious if there was more to meets the eye with its origin. :)

Another of my favorite past fishies was a pleco that was no less than a foot long and about 6" thick. Absolutely beautiful; the kind of thing you'd see in an aquarium.

By the way, these parrots are incredible. I've never had fish that react so clearly to what goes on outside the tank. Using my hand, I can literally herd them all into a corner of the tank, where they'll remain until I walk away. If I catch them while they're all separated (they usually stick together), I've noticed that their second line of defense is simply falling completely still. Not "still" as in "not swimming," "still" as in completely not moving at all.

Chestnuts roasted by Matt @ 01/22/2004 11:25 AM EST

i had a fire eel i would hand feed and it would curl up in my hand and let me wrestle with it. then a gar ate it. then i replaced it with a bigger one. that one croaked. and i've replaced that one with a spotted spiny eel. we'll see what happens. i'm hoping to get a collar on it soon and start some training. p.s., lots of fish are only found in one river on the other side of the world. but some rivers are pretty large. :) one of my stingrays only exists in one locale in south america and i'm one of about 5 people in my internet fish community of over 6,000 that owns one.

Chestnuts roasted by nick @ 01/22/2004 11:44 AM EST

Oh, great. Now I'll feel guilty about eating fish sticks. At a chinese restaurant Little Brother used to frequent, they had a HUGE carp in a tank by the door. One day Bro came in and the tank was empty, so he asked what happened. Apparently, someone left the top off one night and the big sucker leaped to his death. L.B. was too saddened to ask if it fried up good.

Chestnuts roasted by kingklash @ 01/22/2004 11:47 AM EST

Interactive fish are cool.

Chestnuts roasted by Killer Duck @ 01/22/2004 02:31 PM EST

Urrr... I think it's spelt "Koi." However, to be completely honest, there's little difference between those huge koi you see in fancy ponds and your average pet goldfish. Bowl goldies usually never grow that big because they have such confined spaces, but give 'em a big pond, and they'll get gigantic! Well, for fish.

Koi are actually remarkbly smart for fish. Also somewhat emotionable. Some of them really love attention, and will come up to be petted. 'Course, why you'd wanna pet a fish...

Chestnuts roasted by Freezair @ 01/22/2004 03:50 PM EST

Actually, a carp probably would taste good--they eat them all the time in Asia.

If it wasn't an irridescent shark (sounds like you've had those before) it was likely a bala shark--they eat in a weird manner because their mouths are underneath their heads. My wife used to have a tank with 4 big ones that kicked off one night, all at once. It was clean tank, so who knows--it probably is something in their transport.

There are other sharks that look similar (the Calico shark is very close, and lives in one drainage system in central Africa) and have more restricted ranges. But fish that come from only one river aren't uncommon--my web link is pretty much just of my fish that I still have (or are still alive somewhere else). They are found only in Africa (since the Cretaceous, no less), and some, like Xerxes, are found in only a few small rivers attached to the Congo (Zaire?) river.

The bichirs (that's what they're called) that I still have are very puppy like. When they're hungry, they'll follow me or the wife back and forth across the tank, staring at us intently (okay, fish don't blink, so there's no choice on that one) with a "feed me" look. Parrots, like most cichlids, are always hungry, so they'd definitley be interested in the locations of the hands that feed them.

At the store I managed, we had a freshwater Moray Eel named Murray that would hand feed live crayfish. That had to be one of the coolest things to watch--he would grab it in the middle, crush it, then eat it head or tail first, stripping off the claws. Sadly, he died after I left when someone cleaned his tank. So now his skeleton is part of the collection in the Eastend T. rex Centre in southern Saskatchewan (they use it for identifying fish fossils).

Chestnuts roasted by Sean @ 01/22/2004 03:52 PM EST

The fish are called BloodParrots and they do have a natural non dyed color ranging from Orange to Red. Not all are dyed. They can also live up to ten years. In case you dont beleive me heres a bloodparrot fan site. http://parrotcichlid.com/

Chestnuts roasted by Frizzurd @ 01/26/2004 01:55 AM EST

Freezaire hon, I hate to seem bossy or something but you gave some really bad information up there about koi and goldfish.

Goldfish do NOT grow as big as koi.
Amount of space does not affect their growth rate. They vary individually just like people.

There are extreme differences between the looks and personality of goldfish and koi. Goldfish are not as intelligent and are more detatched and "quiet", if that makes sense in context with a fish.

Koi ARE indeed emotive and playful and can be held and petted carefully in the water. Some koi owners even kiss them. Yuck. I'll take the petting, thanks. :p

You may wonder why I have any authority to say this stuff..well, I've owned koi and goldfish both for years. :) Also, to anyone who might be interested in koi, it's VERY expensive to take care of them, and if you have the time and money to do so it's quite fun but it's taxing..

Chestnuts roasted by GJ @ 01/26/2004 10:12 PM EST

I think koi are unfortunately classified so close to goldfish as to adopt the theory that they're just as easy to take care of. I've never owned koi (not my thing, and until recently, never had a large enough tank), but everyone I've known who has ended up with lots of dead koi in a very short time. This includes in tanks, in outdoor ponds -- even in super clean indoor ponds.

Someone in my family (with an outdoor ponds) tried and failed three times to keep koi. I suggested buying a bunch of "feeder" goldfish, who survived a whole lot better and ended up growing quite a bit. I'll never understand why people'll pay 5 bucks for a 3" goldfish and totally neglect the 10/1.00 feeders. So long as they're not coming from an entirely filthy tank (which, admittedly, is kinda common), they're pretty hearty.

Chestnuts roasted by Matt @ 01/26/2004 11:19 PM EST

People pay five bucks for a 3" goldfish and ignore the really cheap feeders because the five bucks goldfish has those...bumpy heads and all sort of stuff. And in China (Well..Hong Kong at least) they're the ones you get to have "good luck" and what nots. Ones with BIG red heads that look strangely like brains.

And feeders are usually not as...plump. They're much skinnier and sleeker without the fantail. And have you ever seen a feeder with bubbles for eyes?

Chestnuts roasted by - @ 01/27/2004 03:39 AM EST

I was talking more just about the regular, larger g-fish -- not the fantails, bubble-eyed, crazy colored crossbred crap. Though, now that I think about it, I guess they're not commonly sold these days.

Chestnuts roasted by Matt @ 01/27/2004 04:47 AM EST

The bigger godfish tend to show up at the beginning of pond seasons, since that's when people want them.

Fantails, Rykins, Lionheads, BubbleEyes, Moors--they're all mutants, and they won't grow as long as a normal goldfish. However, an unmodified goldfish (a feeder that survives it's heritage) can easily get to a foot long or more.

The ones with goofy bodies (like the above) tend to grow as spheres--I've known some that were easily bigger than a softball, maybe approaching handball size. But they have to be pretty old to get there.

Personally, I prefer my predators that don't want to be touched. Just fed and kept clean. They just have too much dignity, I suppose. Or they think they're cats.

Chestnuts roasted by Sean @ 01/28/2004 03:04 PM EST

Meh. ;P Well, nobody's perfect. I don't mind so much being corrected. I was only half-remembering stuff that I saw on a nature documentary several years ago, so I'm bound to be fuzzy on the subject.

Chestnuts roasted by Freezair @ 01/28/2004 08:31 PM EST

i used 2 hav 1 of those jelly bean parrots and it was in a tank with deformed inbred guppies and it was pretty funny because it couldn't swallow them because of they're retarded spines and shit.

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