Alessa

Ok, I went to petsmart today and I saw the cutest thing in the entire world!!! a dwarf platy!!! has anyone heard of these? they are like half of a regular platy and look pretty much the same... but in a little package!!! I was looking on adding one more platy for my tank since I have 2 platies and on eof them is kind of a bully against the other one. But since I had almost no more room left (a platy would have been too much since they are like 2.5 in)... This little thing could be the answer to my Prayers?? according to the tag it grows no more than 1.5 in!!!!

anyone heard of these cute little babies? Would one get along with my regular-sized platies?

Chief_waterchanger

Dino and I have not heard of such a genetic strain of platy and would venture to say that it is probably a lower quality of the same old platy that they normally sell.

(Hypothetical situation)
Baker: I made the cookies too small! OH NO!
Owner of bakery: Sell them as miniature cookies for more money as though they took more work!
Baker: Wow, you're smart..

(/end hypothetical situation)

If someone can provide scientific data showing professional studies done to prove that this is actually a seperate species of xiphophorus then we would love to see that, but until then we both maintain that this is probably not a seperate species.

Alessa

so... its the same old platy, just one that was born "too little" and was bred like that...

they still look cute lol, although i did see some that looked deformed... someone in another forum did say that they are like "balloon platies" missing like a couple vertebrae... idk.

anyone else seen them? Hypothesis?

angelfish220

There was a thread on them a little while ago. I think the agreement was that they were just a deformity and not to buy them.

Alessa

Ok. I've been researching and there seems to be a difference between what people call "balloon platies" and "Dwarf" platies...

Balloon seem to be the ones with the deformed spine, I understand that, but the "dwarf"?

anyone else seen anything like that? they arent "balooned" they look just like a regular platy, but way smaller...

Dino

They are not a true species but the runts that are left in the breeding ponds in Florida after they use the size traps to catch the larger regular selling size adults.

Alessa

so they are different from the "balooned" ones, they are just "little" normal, platies... Ok, thanks dino


Dont want to be annoying but i am just curious on learning from the masters

Dino

No problems.
Even after almost 30 years in the hobby, I learn something new every day.

Alessa

Yes... my bf is obsessed with them, he is bugging me every time he calls me: "did you find out about the platy? they are adorable" lol. He wanted to know if they were just "little" or "ballooned" because we dont really want to buy a fish that is bread on a deformity to get extra money