Leopard SS vs Penang Eruption .. Difference? Albino question too? help.. thanks

[pinoysport]

Hey everyone.... I cant figure this out for the life of me.. I have studied a few pics and read some articles but nothignt ever specific..

Question 1...

What is the difference between the Leopard Snake Skin vs the Penang Eruption? I really cant find it I know they say is the gill plates... but does the Penang Eruption not have the Stress bar that runs across the face with the Leopard SS? What is the difference?


Question 2.

What makes the fish an Albino? The body color? So if you have a yellowish based body its an albino? Does it have to do with the eyes? I have a few pigeons that I have seen listed as albinos. im not sure on this one either. What makes the discus an albino?

Question 3..

This one is prob easier. what are the distinguishing marks for the snake skins? Just on the top and the bottom of the body under the "halo"? I have not seen a snake that have the markings on their entire body unless I have been looking at juvies all this time... Also do the marking need to be dots? or can they be tiny horizontal bars / markings on the body? Kinda like morse code?




Thank you for all of your help over the last few months my range of knowledge has expanded.....Thank you very much all..

let me know what you think... Please post pics if you can to explain the difference or not... lol... thanks for the help ladies and gents.

[vss]

Q1: Penang Eruptions is the trade name of a line of LSS. There are many different lines of LSS nowadays, and Penang Eruptions is just one of them. Compared with ordinary lines of LSS, Penang Eruptions tend to have more defined spots distribution, better web pattern, less horizontal striation like pattern, and better spot coverage. For most LSS lines, the % in a spawn which has the potential for gill plate spots is still relatively small no matter how good-looking the parents are. It's being improved, and it takes time...

Q2: The discus that do not have melanin on the body is called albino i guess. Pigeon blood shows peppers on the body and is therefore not included as albino...not 100% sure about the definition though...

Q3: I don't know which strain you are talking about...

-Xiaofei :)

[Wahter]

Hey everyone.... I cant figure this out for the life of me.. I have studied a few pics and read some articles but nothignt ever specific..

Question 1...

What is the difference between the Leopard Snake Skin vs the Penang Eruption? I really cant find it I know they say is the gill plates... but does the Penang Eruption not have the Stress bar that runs across the face with the Leopard SS? What is the difference?

First, the leopard snakeskin is a cross between a leopardskin and a snakeskin. From the information I have, this was done in the 1990's. Sometimes some breeders will cross the leopard snakeskin back to leopards or in some cases, only cross snakeskins with wild red spotted greens (Lee Tong Juan of Singapore did this to create his Singapore Fireworks strain). Many breeders out there want to create leopard snakeskins with specific patterns - some will have webpatterns on their gillcovers, some will have spots on the gill covers, some have larger spots, some have smaller spots, some have small separate spots, some have small spots that seem to clump together, some have spots on their dorsal and anal fins, some have patterns extending into their tail (caudal) fins. The Penang Eruption is a variety developed by Mr Lee Koon Yen of Malaysia. The Spotted Eruption and Sunrise Eruption are created by Wayne Ng of Hong Kong. The Super Eruption is created by Lim Pei Hao of Malaysia. Well-known breeders create a name for the variety that they breed. If you become a well-known breeder, you can name your variety of leopard snakeskin whatever you want - such as "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious Eruption". :D


Question 2.

What makes the fish an Albino? The body color? So if you have a yellowish based body its an albino? Does it have to do with the eyes? I have a few pigeons that I have seen listed as albinos. im not sure on this one either. What makes the discus an albino?

Albinos can be more accurately described as the genetic mutation with a lack of color (including eyes and body). Take a look at wikipedia's article (albinoism happens among many animals and humans too) - you just don't see too many in the wild because they don't have the coloration for camouflage and their eyes are more sensitive to bright lights (their skin can't produce melanin to protect themselves from the sun either). :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albino



Question 3..

This one is prob easier. what are the distinguishing marks for the this strain? Just on the top and the bottom of the body under the "halo"? I have not seen a snake that have the markings on their entire body unless I have been looking at juvies all this time... Also do the marking need to be dots? or can they be tiny horizontal bars / markings on the body? Kinda like morse code?

Are you referring to leopard snakeskins or albinos? Leopard snakeskins will typically have the fin line patterns on their gillcovers and (not always) have the 14 bars from the snakeskins plus the red spotting from the leopardskin. It's important to note that oftentimes, not every young discus in a spawning of leopard snakeskins will be entirely covered with spots when they mature. There's a lot of genetics involved and there's usually a decent amount where the spotting won't cover the entire body when the offspring grow up. I believe some of this can also be related to what type of food is fed to the fish while it is growing up (some leopard snakeskins are late bloomers too). What can be frustrating is that smaller sized fish usually don't show all of their potential spotting, so it is difficult to predict what it will look like when it matures.

Hope that helps!



Walter

[pinoysport]

Hey Xiaofei and Walter. Thank you very much for the information.... with your replys and with a bit more reading I was able to find some more info.. ill break it down by Question..

Question 1...
Still trying to figure out how can you can tell the difference between the two LSS strains. So if the face isnt covered in dots its just a leopard snakeskin?

Question 2..
Along with the body color.... If the pupil is red its certifies the albino strain..... I looked at as many pics as I could find on the net and on here and it seems to be accurate.. All with the red eye are always called albinos.


question 3..
is it the marking on the face that make a snake skin? Does the whole body eventually have dots on it when it grows up? basically how to identify the snake skin quickly. ....

...

[Wahter]

question 3..
is it the marking on the face that make a snake skin? Does the whole body eventually have dots on it when it grows up? basically how to identify the snake skin quickly. ....

These are snakeskins - typically, they have lines (no spots) running horizontally from head to tail. Sometimes the lines are finer in some fish than in others. The gill covers usually have fine line patterns. Oftentimes they will have 14 bars showing when stressed (not always though).

http://diskus.vs121046.hl-users.com/gb/Farbschlage-gb/Snb/
http://diskus.vs121046.hl-users.com/gb/Farbschlage-gb/Snr/

http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/aquarama2007/pages/img_1267.html
http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/showcase/cary/greatlakes03.jpg
http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/showcase/benwong2008/pages/img_4439.html
http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/showcase/chaikoonseng/pages/img_1340.html
http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/showcase/chaikoonseng/pages/img_1332.html

[Wahter]

Question 1...
Still trying to figure out how can you can tell the difference between the two LSS strains. So if the face isnt covered in dots its just a leopard snakeskin?

Leopard snakeskins developed by different breeders will have different names. Some will have different spotting (larger or smaller) on the bodies and different sized spotting/ different patterns on the gill covers. Bear in mind, they will look somewhat similar because they are derived from a snakeskin and a leopardskin discus at one point.

Here are some leopard snakeskins - the last photo is of Wayne's Sunrise Eruption - surely you can see the face on that fish has a different pattern / spotting than the others in these other photos.

http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/showcase/chaikoonseng/pages/img_1328.html
http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/aquarama2007/pages/img_1272.html
http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/showcase/peterchoo/pages/pchoo_209531.html
http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/showcase/benwong2008/pages/img_4492a.html
http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/aquarama2007/pages/img_1274.html
http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/showcase/roykhoo/pages/img_1408.html

http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/showcase/wayne2008/pages/img_5156.html

Hope that helps,


Walter

[tdiscusman]

...
question 3..
is it the marking on the face that make a snake skin? Does the whole body eventually have dots on it when it grows up? basically how to identify the snake skin quickly. ....

...

Hi pinoysport,
All Snake Skin have 14 stressed bars and have striations. A 14 bars with dots then it's a LSS

Tony

[rickztahone]

Walter those are some fantastic pictures. that group shot is amazing!

[Wahter]

Walter those are some fantastic pictures. that group shot is amazing!

Thanks!

I'm going to try to make it over to Aquarama 2011 - maybe see if I can take a side trip into Malaysia and visit a couple of the breeders there.


Walter

[Jhhnn]

All snakeskins are related, way back, to a small group of fish who had 14 bars and that very fineline spiderweb pattern on the faces, gillplates and even their whole bodies. Penang eruptions are just one kind of snakeskin, slightly and sometimes recognizably different than other lines that have similar markings, notably LSS.

Penang eruption-

http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showthread.php?p=564026&highlight=penang+eruption#post564026

LSS, post #5-

http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showthread.php?t=75880&highlight=leopard+snakeskins

Pretty subtle, huh? As Wahter points out, some of the Eruption strains have been further refined to have spots rather than fine line stripes on the foreheads, faces and gill plates, but that's not universally true...

Kenny has also been offering some PExLSS. Breeders have to do this sometimes, outcross to similar but mostly unrelated lines to keep the bloodlines strong... And discus breeders are free to do so, unlike breeders of dogs, cats and other domesticated animals, because they don't market their stock as having pedigrees. A LLS having 1 PE great-grandparent is, for all intents and purposes, a LSS. The practice is actually good for discus in general, preventing problems that can arise from close inbreeding for many generations. Sometimes enthusiasts get hung up on the idea of having a "pure" strain, something that's basically not been achieved with snakeskins in general. As I understand it, snakeskin pairs will always throw some non-snakeskin offspring. With Penang Eruptions, those offspring are eruption leopards, with Leopard Snakeskins, they're Leopards... Both of which are bred on their own merits, as well. Throwbacks to ancestral forms are not limited to those possibilities, by any means.

At least, that's my understanding. There's always more to learn, always surprises along the way... Hopefully, I'll be able to gain real world experience breeding the snakeskins I have, see how that stacks up to what the literature tells me...

[pinoysport]

These are snakeskins - typically, they have lines (no spots) running horizontally from head to tail. Sometimes the lines are finer in some fish than in others. The gill covers usually have fine line patterns. Oftentimes they will have 14 bars showing when stressed (not always though).

http://diskus.vs121046.hl-users.com/gb/Farbschlage-gb/Snb/
http://diskus.vs121046.hl-users.com/gb/Farbschlage-gb/Snr/

http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/aquarama2007/pages/img_1267.html
http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/showcase/cary/greatlakes03.jpg
http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/showcase/benwong2008/pages/img_4439.html
http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/showcase/chaikoonseng/pages/img_1340.html
http://www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/showcase/chaikoonseng/pages/img_1332.html

ok... that makes it more clear.... so let me just ask this.. I know some of the spawn will not have markings as the others do. all of the ones you shown here have the body fully covered. I have seen some SS that do not have all of their body covered just the face and sometimes the gill plate.

So would you say all SS should at the very least have the SS markings on their face and gill pate?

Your info is awesome!! thanks !!

[pinoysport]

Hi pinoysport,
All Snake Skin have 14 stressed bars and have striations. A 14 bars with dots then it's a LSS

Tony

thats a good rule of thumb for me. easy to remember.. thanks!!

[tdiscusman]

ok... that makes it more clear.... so let me just ask this.. I know some of the spawn will not have markings as the others do. all of the ones you shown here have the body fully covered. I have seen some SS that do not have all of their body covered just the face and sometimes the gill plate.

So would you say all SS should at the very least have the SS markings on their face and gill pate?

Your info is awesome!! thanks !!

SS are notorious for late in coloring up, most would not show markings and/or color till they have reach 4". The one you saw, that do not have any marking, maybe juvenile or it could be a blue scorpion (BS) which is a cross between a SS and a blue diamond, with the BS the body would be mostly solid blue color and striations on the face and gill plate.

HTH
Tony

[Jhhnn]

So would you say all SS should at the very least have the SS markings on their face and gill pate?

For the most part, yes. This article gives some history wrt snakeskins-

http://www.brooklynaquariumsociety.org/articles/2002-sept-pg%2029.htm

While 9 bar fish w/ snakeskin markings show up occasionally, they don't breed true, at all. At the other end of the spectrum, occasional 14 bar fish colored basically like brown discus also show up- Kenny offered a few some while back in a shipment of domestic browns.

Any fish that has 14 bars and the fineline spiderweb markings is definitely a snakeskin, whether that's just on their face and gill covers or over their whole body... Eddie posted pics of some Japanese snakeskins awhile back w/ red bodies and snakeskin markings kinda like a brown discus would have some thicker wavy blue markings on their face, forehead, gillcovers and fins... very unusual.

Snakeskins don't breed true, so I'm sure that some of the siblings of what we call blue scorpions aren't snakeskins. Quite what they look like, dunno... I have 8 blue scorpions, and they range in color from almost pure full body snakeskin to almost pure blue diamond-

http://s908.photobucket.com/albums/ac286/Jhhnn/fish/

They all show snakeskin markings to one degree or another... all but one show 14 bars, if faintly on some...

Mostly, snakeskins have been bred to have the fineline markings over their bodies and fins, no matter whether they're greenish, blue, red or albino...

[pinoysport]

I just wanted to circle back with everyone who replied.

Thank you very much. This helped alot. ......


The snake skin has four horizontal lines on the forehead right?

[Jhhnn]

I just wanted to circle back with everyone who replied.

Thank you very much. This helped alot. ......


The snake skin has four horizontal lines on the forehead right?

Not necessarily. It's the fineline spiderweb-like markings that distinguish snakeskins in general, along with 14 bars vs 9 bars. Non-snakeskins have broader color lines, and spotted snakeskins have smaller spots than their spotted non-snakeskin cousins.

Check this thread-

http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showthread.php?t=77004

The fish with small red spots in post #5 are Leopard snakeskins, while the fish with bigger red spots in post #9 are regular leopards...

Capische?