White Butterfly discus (white pigeons)

[ryansmith83]

When I first saw White Butterfly discus in the late 90s, I knew they were my Holy Grail discus. There have been many types of white pigeon discus over the years but it's hard to find the ones that turn mostly solid white but keep the blue sheen in the fins and the orange pigeon markings on the face.

I've finally gotten a group from Kenny's Discus that show some real promise. At 3 - 4" they are already turning white, something that my last few batches didn't do until about 5". You can see that it starts in the face and works its way back to the tail of the fish. These guys should look incredible when they're adults.

I do love wild-type discus but every now and then a pigeon variety will catch my eye and scream out to me -- these have been screaming out to me for a decade.

 

[Bllib]

Wow those are nice!!

 

[peathenster]

beautiful fish

 

[Juxtaroberto]

Those look amazing.

Some day...

 

[3dees]

nothing but wilds in a natural setting for me, but I must say those are really beautiful fish. I think a well planted tank would really make them shine.

 

[ryansmith83]

Actually, it would make them pepper up since they're pigeons. So no planted tank for these guys.

 

[3dees]

do you think that they would pepper if you painted the background a light color and used light colored substrate? I have wilds so no peppering. breeding is one thing but I would'nt want a bb tank as a show tank, but thats just me.

 

[ryansmith83]

Peppering is the same as stress/mood bars on non-pigeon discus (including wilds, of course). On pigeons it is displayed all over the body rather than in vertical bars, thanks to a gene mutation. The fish in your avatar is displaying its bars... a pigeon in the same situation would pepper.

You could probably get away with a light background and light substrate/sand. I'm not sure what would happen if you used dark driftwood, though. Something tells me they'd turn dark. If you look around at other show tanks that people have posted, the discus often tend to show their bars and peppering.

I thought about trying light sand with these guys, but not until they get older. I always raise out young fish in bare bottom tanks just to make cleaning and water changes easier.

 

[R1_Ridah]

Peppering is the same as stress/mood bars on non-pigeon discus (including wilds, of course). On pigeons it is displayed all over the body rather than in vertical bars, thanks to a gene mutation. The fish in your avatar is displaying its bars... a pigeon in the same situation would pepper.

If you look around at other show tanks that people have posted, the discus often tend to show their bars and peppering.

.

It's hard for me to believe that the bars shown on a wild discus is an indicator for stress? All the wilds in my tank perfectly show the bars and they behave as comfortable as can be. In a sense that they are alert, out going, constantly looking and grazing for food, fins are pronounced and not clamp...etc.. etc..

In addition many videos I've seen that showcase wilds in their natural environment show the bars and end up loosing/fainting when they are in holding tanks. It seems the opposite that when they don't show their bar is when they are stressed.

Here's a video of wilds in their natural environment.. all showing bars.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B99IuJ2t34M

I'm new to discus and all but I just can't believe that by my wilds showing the bars means they are stressed. More of by them showing their bars they are in a good mood..

Very nice Discus by the way.

 

[ryansmith83]

Stress bars is just a common term for the bars. They're no different than the bars you see on things like severums. The fish can turn them on and off depending on their environment and mood. Some people also call them mood bars.

Most wild discus show these bars if kept in a planted or decorated tank. It's a way of trying to blend in and camouflage itself with its surroundings. Wilds can turn their bars off, though. If you look at certain wild fish kept in bare bottom, light colored tanks you will see that they don't keep the bars all the time. I've seen this a lot on wild browns, heckels, and greens.