Scientific name: Mikrogeophagus Ramirezi var “Black Celestial or Dark Knight”
Currently we are in a co-op with Ben from Ben’s Fishworld for our Dark Knight rams. Ben’s quality is unmatched and because of this co-op we can focus more on Apistogramma ourselves
We have found that our pair breeds true and therefore find it accurate to call them “Dark Knights”
Fish that are sold will be juvenile and in some cases (Generally the females) still have a slight silverish belly that needs to grow fully black. This However comes with age and we guarantee they will look like their parents.
Origin :The majority of literature suggests that this species is restricted to the Venezuelan and Colombian llanos of the Río Orinoco drainage, although one of the specimens in our images is said to have been collected in the rio Purus, Brazil, an Amazon tributary located some distance from that watershed.
The Llanos is a vast, highly biodiverse system of tropical savannah grasslands, seasonally-flooded plains and forests covering an area measuring almost 600,000 square kilometres in Venezuela and Colombia. There are well-defined annual weather patterns with distinct wet and dry seasons and year-round high temperatures.
However seeing that these are a highly line bred version of what is described above they will do best in a ph ranging from 6-7.5 and a temperature of 28-30 Celsius
Difficulty in keeping: Easy
Maximum size: 6-7cm Males 4-5 cm Females
Selling size: 3-4 cm and above (sizes are for males females might be smaller)
Temperature: 27 – 32 °C (30°C preferred)
pH: 6-7.8 Our fish are bred and grown at a ph between 6.0 and 7.5
Diet: Primarily carnivorous and apparently feeds mostly on benthic invertebrates in nature. In the aquarium live and frozen foods such as Brine shrimp, Daphnia and Blackworms should be offered regularly although most specimens will also learn to accept dried alternatives with pelleted products generally preferred to flake.
Disclaimer: Photos are taken of our own fish and usually the breeding parents, photos are for reference only and actual fish you will receive might slightly vary.