I found two small fish in my store yesterday, and I have no idea what they are or where they came from. They were down in a bottom tank, so who knows how long they've been there. I'd post a picture, but they're fast and impossible to photograph without it turning into a huge blur.

I'm thinking they may be rasboras, but they could also be tetras as well. The morphology is as follows:

• Slim body, 1-1.5" in length
• A coppery-blue color, much like a Harlequin Rasbora
• Upwards-pointing pectoral fins, like a Hatchetfish
• Upwards pointing mouth, like a Hatchetfish
• Large eyes
• A black, irregular line running from just behind the gill plates to the end of the caudal peduncle, with a few irregular splotches preceeding it; this line does not extend into the caudal fin
• They do have dorsal fins

I'm stumped, honestly. It's showing morphology traits from several different species of fish, but it's like nothing I've seen before.

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Try to get a pic or a video of some sort.Could be very young,hence the stripe(my macs have a stripe like that until they mature.)

Could you possibly draw them out if you can get pics of them?

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http://bountifulbettas.blogspot.com/

"Come to the dark side....we have cookies...and filters/heaters/and water changes!"

Best I could do, sorry. I've had these guys about a month now, and their colors aren't changing any.

*edit* They show up around 0:25 in the video.

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I have no clue.Looks like a tetra of sort but they definitely look to have bent spines too(NVM,Its the pics,lol.),at least in the pics.Young black neons perhaps?Or a black darter tetra.

And yeah I can tell they are hard to photograph,lol.

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http://bountifulbettas.blogspot.com/

"Come to the dark side....we have cookies...and filters/heaters/and water changes!"

They're not black neons. Their body shape isn't like most slim tetras; they've got upturned, pointed mouths instead of blunt ones like the black neon tetras.

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Rasbora paviana - Seriously Fish
That kinda looks like it too though

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http://bountifulbettas.blogspot.com/

"Come to the dark side....we have cookies...and filters/heaters/and water changes!"

Nope, that's not it. Pectoral fins are in completely the wrong place. They basically look like a hatchetfish that's had its belly cut off, if that makes any sense.

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It does definitely.Meh Im at a loss.I think a hatchet fish bred with a rasbora just to confuzzle you.

did it work?

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http://bountifulbettas.blogspot.com/

"Come to the dark side....we have cookies...and filters/heaters/and water changes!"

They look like one of the devario species that have been showing up ... have a look at that genus online and i'll bet you find something similar.

Found it! It's a Laubuca dadiburjori; also known as Chela dadiburjori. I confirmed this with several other photos. Also known as the Dadio, Orange Hatchet Fish, and Three-Spot Hatchetfish (it's technically related to the danios). Supposedly these guys are incredibly difficult to keep, and yet the two I've got have been living in my 10g community with minimal water changes for the last month or so, with no ill effects. Go figure.



Thanks for the tip, Fishweller!

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Very cool. There are so many new asian fish showing up from the area of Myanmar and its borders. I had an interesting "orange flash" devario for awhile: I did ID it at the time but the latin escapes me now. Males were smaller and more colorful than females and except for one or two hardy females they were short lived in my tank - less than a year, more than a month. I wonder if the bent spines are related to an insufficient diet in captivity, or if they are being bred somewhere. Seems unlikely, unless they were the unbought fish from a previous shipment.