What fish do I have??

[Vissengirl]

Ok, first post here !! *celebrate

I've had freshwater aquariums and fish on and off for over 10 years. Was hooked the day I saw the little 10 gallon in my brothers bedroom. Took it over after he went to college. After venturing out on my own I got a 30 gallon that I had for years until I relocated over seas and now that I'm back home in Canada and settled again I've finally set up another 30 gallon. I used to think I wasn't such a newbie at fish until I got the internet and started reading this time around I think it's pretty safe to assume that I'm clueless,

SO, I'm joining this forum and figure the more I read your discussions, the more I'll learn and already have

First thing I wanted to do though was do up my little aquarium inventory list in my signature so I can at least try to blend in with the crowd here a little, lol.

Problem is that every one seems to call the same fish by different names. Does anyone have a good site for future reference that could help with figuring out exactly what the proper names for freshwater fish are?

Two questions I had in particular were about two of my Platies and my two Angelfish. I know the guy at the store told me the different names of the Angelfish with stripes vs the (marble?) Angelfish. I have two striped ones but I know (or thought there was) there's a more proper name for them.
The other question is regarding a pair of orange platies that from what I've read should be called something like black swordtail orange platies?lol.

Sorry I don't have a pic to help.

Anyway, this looks like a great site and I'm glad to have found it *thumbsups *PEACE!*

 

[Fish Friend]

welcome to the tank ! youll find alot out here ! well firstly, people call fish from sientific names or just common names, for exapmle, the rams sientific name is Papiliochromis/Microgeophagus ramirezi. Your orange platies are... orange platies lol wit the swordtail, they have like little sword tipe things attached onto the end of their fin, but with your platies they dont have one, the marbled angelfish is correct but i am not sure about the striped angel...You can check http://fish.orbust.net/fishindex.html that out and have a look at the index of fish there. hoped this helped

 

[R0UNDEYEZ]

Welcome to the tank, We have a list of fish specics here as well. If you look up at the top of the page its under the tab "freshwater fish profiles" That will help you find out what fish you have and you might even learn a little about the ones you ID since it has info about them as well.
As far as "proper names" the only proper name is the scientific name since the common names people give the fish can vary from region to region or just be completely wrong.
(My whitecloud mountain minnows were sold to me "white cloud tetras" to give you an example)
hope that helped!

 

[FisheyLisa]

Also liveaquaria.com has pictures, scientific, and common names- heh then you can subsequently buy them. so does www.aquariacentral.com, though the interface is tricky sometimes (though I just may be an idiot!)

 

[FroggyFox]

Welcome I think its a common thing around this hobby to see the same thing referred to by different names. Even in some types of fish (cichlids) there are discussions and changes of scientific names...so someone might call them a haplocromis and they're really a cyrtocara (probably butchered the spelling)...or then with common names...we have nicknames for some...like I call harlequin rasboras "harlies" a lot without even thinking about it. Another popular one is the otto which is really short for otocinclus... SO in YOUR signature...you should call them whatever you call them AND you can always update it if you find information somewhere that tells you your orange platies are really orange wag sunburst platies. Generally as long as you have "platy" in there...we'll have a pretty good idea what you're talking about

 

[Lotus]

This site has a bunch of info and pictures of the various angel strains: http://www.angelsplus.com/galry-angel-a-g.htm

 

[Vissengirl]

Thank you for the warm welcome, and thank you for those links. They were helpful *thumbsups
So I believe I have silver angelfish but my orange platies are still confusing me. I believe they may be swordtails (only the male has the long protruding black fin on the bottom of his tail). They both have black fins and orange bodies. Are the black fins specific to wagtail and swordtail platies? How would one tell the difference between a female swordtail platy and a wag platy?

Thanks again for your help *SUNSMILE*

 

[Lotus]

Ummm... a swordtail isn't the same as a platy, it's a different species.

Red wag refers to the color (orange with a black tail), both platies and swordtails come in this color variation.

Platies have a sligtly rounder shape, especially in the head area. Swordtails are kind of flat along the top. A google image search or looking at the profile section here on MFT should help you work out what you have.

 

[Vissengirl]

WELL THAN!!, . Don't know how I made that mistake. I was sure the guy at the pet store called them platies. I'm pretty sure than that they're swordtails in that case. Platies don't have a long protruding fin on the bottom of their tail right?

 

[Lotus]

No, if it has a "sword" on the bottom of its tail, it's a swordtail (male). You'll discover that many LFS employees don't know much about fish.

 

[Vissengirl]

Ok cool, thank you. Glad to have that finally figured out. *PEACE!*