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My seven 1982 FAMA articles on angelfish genetics covered the
mutant genes that are present in today's commercially-bred
angelfish. Combinations of two mutant genes also were discussed
and illustrated.
Some phenotypes have been named, such as black lace, black,
marble, ghost, blushing, smokey, chocolate, gold, zebra, zebra
lace, blue, butterfly and cobra. Additional phenotypes that are
seen occasionally are blushing marble, blushing smokey, blushing
chocolate, blushing new gold (white), and several others that
are less distinctive, such as several combinations with zebra.
It is understandable that no names have been applied to the many
phenotypes that are not easily distinguishable from others. In
fact it is not uncommon to encounter an angelfish that must be
tested genetically, by appropriate crosses, to discover its
complete genotype, even though it is usually possible to discern
part of its genotype from its appearance.
A distinctive angelfish that has not been named is one for
which I propose the name "clown" angelfish, the subject of this
article. This fish, having a bold and striking blotched pattern
on the body, is actually a modified zebra lace, either with, or
without, a single dose of stripeless. Its fins are like the fins
of a zebra lace. The front of the adult's body is speckled with
black dots and its ventral fins are horizontally banded with
light and dark.
The clown angelfish has large black spots and blotches on a light-colored body.
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| The clown angelfish has large black spots and blotches on a light-colored body. |
Over the years I had noticed that the zebra lace (having
zebra plus one dose of dark) angelfish may produce offspring in
which all of the zebra lace individuals have three straight,
uniform, dark, vertical body stripes (Fig. 1 left).
Occasionally I saw zebra lace with crooked or broken body
stripes, but I did not have records of their parentage. More
recently, Bill Lutz found, and gave me some zebra lace with
irregular markings instead of three stripes on the body. I
raised these to maturity and kept one pair. These were tested by
crossing each with wild-type (silver). The female produced 267,
all either zebra or zebra lace.
Fig. 1: Zebra lace. This commonly seen type has three straight vertical stripes on the body.
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| Fig. 1: Zebra lace. This commonly seen type has three straight vertical stripes on the body. |
The male (Fig. 2 right) produced
330, all either zebra or zebra lace. Thus, both of these zebra
lace with irregular markings were homozygous (double-dose) for
zebra, and heterozygous (single-dose) for dark. All of the
offspring had irregular markings, varying from slightly
irregular or broken three stripes to blotched, with little or no
striped pattern, in some of the zebra lace. Since all of the irregulary-marked offspring were heterozygous (single-dose)
zebras, I concluded that irregular marking in zebra lace is not
a result of homozygous, rather than heterozygous, zebra.
Fig. 2: Clown male, a zebra lace with irregular markings.
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| Fig. 2: Clown male, a zebra lace with irregular markings. |
Fig. 3: Clown, from silver female x clown male in Fig.2.
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| Fig. 3: Clown, from silver female x clown male in Fig.2 |
Although every one of the offspring of irregular zebra lace x
wild-type (silver) had irregular markings, none of the zebras
had as bizarre markings as the most blotched of the zebra lace.
The zebras all had vertical stripes, sometimes broken and
sometimes with one or more partial stripes.
Fig. 4: clown, from silver female x clown male in Fig. 2.
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| Fig. 4: clown, from silver female x clown male in Fig. 2. |
Fig. 5: Clown, from silver female x clown male in fig. 2.
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| Fig. 5: Clown, from silver female x clown male in fig. 2. |
While many of the
zebra lace had irregular stripes like the zebras, some had very
interesting blotches and spots. Those that had the most blotches
and the least striping were saved for future breeders, examples
of which are illustrated in Figs. 3-7. These will be bred
brother to sister to find out whether the percent of blotched
offspring can be increased in that way.
Fig. 6: Clown from silver female x clown male in Fig. 2.
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| Fig. 6: Clown from silver female x clown male in Fig. 2. |
The problem in trying to produce clown angelfish from parents
like I used, crossed with silver, is that many of their
offspring have uneven stripes instead of large blotches. Those
with uneven stripes are too similar to zebra lace to deserve
being called clown angelfish. This problem was solved, rather by
accident, by Bill Lutz, who had kept some irregularly-marked
zebra lace when he gave me some. In an attempt to eventually
produce some "purple" angelfish (blushing black), Mr. Lutz first
crossed a zebra lace female, which happened to be one with
irregular markings, with a blushing male. Some of the offspring
from this cross were zebra butterfly (one dose each of zebra,
dark and stripeless), which I discussed, along with butterfly,
in Part Four (August, 1982) of my angelfish genetics series.
Fig. 7: Clown, from silver female x clown male in Fig. 2.
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| Fig. 7: Clown, from silver female x clown male in Fig. 2. |
I had found that adding zebra to butterfly increases the
number of dark blotches on the body. Butterfly has one or
sometimes two or three dark blotches, while zebra butterfly
(Fig. 8) has additional dark blotches. The interesting and
useful outcome of the cross by Mr. Lutz was not that he got some
zebra butterflys, which were expected, but that every one of
these had more dark blotches on the body than any zebra
butterflys that I had seen.
Fig. 8: Butterfly zebra (one dose each of dark, stripeless and zebra). One parent was a zebra lace with uniform stripes, as in Fig. 1.
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| Fig. 8: Butterfly zebra (one dose each of dark, stripeless and zebra). One parent was a zebra lace with uniform stripes, as in Fig. 1. |
In fact, his zebra butterflys were
so hightly blotched (Fig. 9) that most of them appeared
indistinguishable from blotched zebra lace. Although the
genetics of the irregularly-marked zebra lace and the
highly-blotched zebra butterfly has not been investigated, it
appears to be a possibility that the genetic modification that
causes irregular markings in zebra lace may also be responsible
for increased blotching in zebra butterfly.
Fig.
9: Clown (one dose each of dark, stripeless and zebra)> One parent was a zebra lace with irregular markings, as in Fig. 2.
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| Fig. 9: Clown (one dose each of dark, stripeless and zebra)> One parent was a zebra lace with irregular markings, as in Fig. 2. |
A clown angelfish is either a zebra lace or zebra butterfly
that is genetically modified, resulting in large blotches on the
body. The best method of producing clown angelfish, at least
until more is known, probably is to cross a clown angelfish with
a blushing. You will not get all clown offspring, but you also
will get no striped individuals. If you happen to have a clown
parent like one of my original pair (one dose of dark and two
doses of zebra), you may get about 50% clown offspring because
all of the offspring will receive one dose of zebra and one dose
of stripeless, and half of them will receive one dose of dark.
If your clown parent happens to be like the type produced by Mr.
Lutz (one dose each of dark, zebra and stripeless), you will get
more types of offspring, including blushing. I would not breed
clown to clown for commercial production, because this mating
will produce some offspring without the gene for stripeless, and
these could be striped instead of blotched.
At this point, the unknown in breeding clown angelfish is the
genetics of the irregular marking. If, for example, a single
recessive modifier is involved, you would get no clown angelfish
from the above two crosses if the blushing parent does not carry
the recessive gene. If a single dominant modifier is needed to
get the clown pattern, then your chances are better for these
two crosses. If you get no clowns from clown x blushing, then I
would cross the offspring having zebra and dark (either zebra
lace or zebra butterfly) back with clown. I hope that the
genetics of the modifier(s) will be worked out so that exact
instructions for breeding clown angelfish will be possible.
The fact that every clown angelfish differs from every other
clown, like fingerprints, adds to the excitement of keeping and
raising this angelfish type. Even though the clown angelfish is
not true-breeding, and will not be, it is striking and different
enough to be an important addition for the commercial and
amateur angelfish breeder.
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