What Species of Clown Is this???

[Tarolisol]

wierd from what i can tell its a big empty white screen, with a slight hint of grey. Anyone else concour?

[Bob I]

Originally Posted by Delphinus

Anyhow, one method that clownfish guys swear by, is the colour of the ring around the eye. If it's clear (or orange), it's A. ocellaris. And if it's dark, muddy, or outright back then it's A. percula.

What ring around the eye I have two of what I am sure are A. percula. They have black around the pupils. pupils. I have two A.ocellaris. They have black rings around their pupils. At least in the human eye it would be called the white of the eye. IOW my percs have clear whites, and the Ocellaris have black whites. Anyone who has stayed with me this far, does that make any sense.

BTW these are all wild caught, and the Perculas have the characteristic black banding.

[Delphinus]

Um .. You've totally lost me there Bob. (Yes, I did mean the ring around the pupils. pupils. ) But I'm afraid I didn't understand any of the rest of what you said.

[Bob I]

Originally Posted by Delphinus

Um .. You've totally lost me there Bob. (Yes, I did mean the ring around the pupils. pupils. ) But I'm afraid I didn't understand any of the rest of what you said.

I did not think anyone would, so I will retry. I have four wild caught clowns. The two that are Ocellaris as far as I am concerned have BLACK rings around the pupils , The two that are A. percula because the markings say so, have CLEAR rings around the pupils, which is exactly opposite to what you said. Did you get it backward perhaps

[AJ_77]

The sites I linked seem to back up Bob... And the ring around the pupil makes the eyes look fuller/blacker in the Ocellaris there...

Nothing like clearing the issue up some.

[Bob I]

Well the more pictures I look at the more confused I become. I do know that my percs look exactly like the lower picture on this site
http://www.exotictropicals.com/encyc...ruepercula.php
But one of what I have taken to be A. ocellaris has SOME black edging around the white bars, According to some people they NEVER do, but they have the black rings around the pupils. I do get more confused.

[Quinn]

Tough to be 100% certain but I do think we're looking at A. ocellaris here, just based on what seems to be more common in stores here. From Rob Toonen:

"Technically the difference between the two has little to do with coloration -most of the clowns show coloration variation throughout their range. The real difference is in the number of fin rays in the dorsal fin:
-A. ocellaris has 11 (but in rare individuals 10) fin rays in the dorsal fin.
-A. percula has 10 (but in rare individuals 9).

The spinous anterior portion of the dorsal fine is elevated in A. percula (3.1 - 3.3 times the length as opposed to 2.1 - 2.9 in A. ocellaris). There are black varieties of A. ocellaris around Darwin, and the standard "black margin around the white bars" description does not hold -- even in Fautin's book, although she says this is one way to tell them apart, she then has a picture of A. ocellaris with black margins. The best way to tell them apart is the location from which they were collected, because the animals have non-overlapping distributions: If the clown comes from northwestern Australia towards the base of SE Asia, it's A. ocellaris. If it comes from Northern Queensland or Maelanesia, it's A. percula."

And remember, Toonen is originally from Alberta so he must be right.

Perhaps part of the problem as well is that there are several variants of each recognized in the hobby, for A. ocellaris, the regular variant and the black variant, and for A. percula, the regular variant, the onyx variant and the Solomon Islands variant. Some individuals may believe the A. percula variants with large patches of black are the only variant of the species, and that all others are A. ocellaris.

[Bob I]

Thanks Quinn for the added confusion. , now when I look at my fish, the ones I thought were A.percula are Ocellaris, and the Ocellaris are percula. That is going by the dorsal fin height. However, if we go by the usual price difference, it is still the other way around. The two sets are in different tanks, so it does not really matter I guess.

[Delphinus]

Well .. maybe I have it backwards then. I did another search on RC and NOW the first post I read says "clear=percula muddy=ocellaris". I'm also reading that the "muddiness" may be VERY subtle in some cases, not really showing up on photos.

Oh well. I tried to post something that was supposed to help. But I guess it didn't. Don't shoot the messenger.

[AJ_77]

It was as helpful as anything, Tony. I was just going to say, "Percula have more black."