Micropoecilia picta

[GaryofMontreal]

A friend sent me some photos of Micropoecilia picta that he had brought back from a trip to South America. He no longer has them, but they are beautiful little fish. When I was at the American Killifish Association convention last year, I had a talk with some US livebearer keepers who were talking about picta like we'd talk about black flies in Springtime - they seemed to be so common to them they were barely worth talking about. I've never seen one outside of photographs.
I've been struggling with my Micropoecilia branneri, raising three surviving fry to a 2m, 1f group that's still too young to breed. These photos got me thinking about these little softwater livebearers.

I've read hints of M. picta out west, but to have these little fish and to breed them in any quantity can be very different things. How is picta to keep, how delicate are they and how are they to breed? Does anyone out there have any direct experience to share?

[OldMan]

Like you Gary, I have only seen pictures but I may get to see some real ones this spring. I will be at the ALA convention in April and if I get a chance I may pick some up. There is no telling what may show up there. If I have the room I would also like to get some nice X montezumae but the ones I have seen have all been unsexed juveniles.

[blainep]

Overall I find my little group of Pictas are pretty easy to keep. They are physically similar to Guppies and Endlers, I find they seem to prefer warmer water, females are quite aggressive and they reproduce much slower than Guppies or Endlers.

I keep them in hard Calgary tap water at about 78 degrees f. Males have some interesting tactics for impressing females. They will either swim rapidly in circles around a female in full display or they bump the female with their noses in her gravid area.

If the female is not interested, she will chase the male away, if he still persists, she will beat up the male. There is also aggression between the females, there are definite alpha females and they seem to bicker quite often for the alpha position, but I've never seen any damage done.

Fry drops seem to be much smaller than most other livebearers I keep, generally 4 or 5 fry at most. I'm sure there is some fry munching, but it seems that once born the fry are ignored. I find new fry swimming thru the tank unmolested.

I currently have one colony fairly established and a second started. I'm planning to move some more fry this weekend in hopes of getting a third colony started.

Hopefully, by the time the weather warms up, I'll have a few available . If I can get a clear picture or two, I'll post them to give people a look.

[stanman]

I raised many of the M. picta "red" for several years. I think Charles Clapsaddle still has these from my stock. They were like raising guppies. I kept them at between 78-84F, water changes every week, several feedings a day on various live, frozen and dried food -- always live baby brine shrimp, hard (15 KH and GH) alkaline (7.8) water in a colony with lots of plants. The red form has golden females and grey ones. There weren't any problems. A problem fish is Ph. caudimaculus reticulatus. They do not like heat or huge water changes. My summers weakened the line so much after 3 years that they died out. I expect in a colder Canadian climate they would be fine. One of the truly great little livebearers though and very under appreciated!

[Melody]

Charles has your stock and so did I and so does Blaine. Thank you for sharing them, they're strong, beautiful specimens.

Our water is soft and neutral. I gave the Picta Red away and my neighbour completely ignores them. They're in a community and treated just like everyone else. The 'regular' Picta has been around longer. There's also a black Picta out there now, which I believe is a location variant but I can't recall from where.

Picta are a good beginner Micro, in my opinion. They need their clean water and little else, at least in my local parameters.

The problem with our colder Canadian climate is it is only cold in the Winter (other than here in British California). Our Summers are sweltering much of the time, although normally they don't go above 32c during heatwaves. I was frantic with the Godeids but they didn't seem in the least bothered by it. It's the first and last time I concerned myself about warm temperatures but I've never kept Ph. caudimaculus reticulatus, so maybe I'd get concerned real quick if I did :wideeyed: . Fish can be such quirky characters.