Albino rainbow shark

Care at a glance

Overview

The albino rainbow shark is a white or cream form with orange to red fins, a territorial bottom dweller for a roomy tank. It is a fish for a keeper with a little experience.

Caring for the albino rainbow shark

Give an albino rainbow shark a roomy tank of at least 63 gal (240 L), with a sand or smooth gravel bottom. Add caves, rocks and wood for it to claim as territory, and break up clear sight lines with decor. Albino fish generally have unpigmented eyes that cope poorly with bright light, so leave shaded spots under wood or plants.

Keep it at 68 to 79°F (20 to 26°C) with a pH of 6.5 to 7.5. Feed algae, sinking pellets and frozen foods.

The albino has the same territorial temperament as the standard fish, as care sheets describe it. It is a color change, not a calmer shark, and it gets more aggressive as it matures.

Keep one per tank, since it is solitary and territorial toward its own kind and similar-looking fish. House it with active fish of the middle and upper levels that it can largely ignore, and avoid other bottom dwellers it would harass.

Albino rainbow sharks are rarely recorded breeding in home aquariums, and most rainbow sharks in the trade are raised commercially with hormones. Albinism in ornamental fish is usually recessive, so pairing albino to albino breeds the form true.

Good to know

The albino rainbow shark also appears in shops as the albino ruby shark or albino red-finned shark, usually as a small juvenile. Albinism strips melanin, so the gray body pigment is gone and the eyes look pink or red where blood shows through. The fins stay red because that color comes from separate pigment cells carrying carotenoid and pteridine pigments rather than melanin. A farmed anerythristic line also exists, with pale yellowish fins, and it has sometimes been mistaken for Epalzeorhynchos munense.

In the wild

The albino rainbow shark is a captive mutation, not something you would find in the species' rivers. Where the albino line started is not recorded, and no breeder or date has been published for it. Shop fish come from commercial farms in Thailand and other countries, since wild-caught rainbow sharks are effectively absent from the trade.

Common questions

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