Amphiprion ocellaris “Wyoming White” Clownfish

The Wyoming White Clownfish is a designer variant of the Ocellaris Clownfish, Amphiprion ocellaris. It originated in the tanks of Bill Addison’s C-Quest hatchery several years back now. But there’s an interesting genetic story at play here. Despite being almost solid white, in every other respect, the Wyoming White is simply a standard A. ocellaris. It just has two copies of a mutant gene that affect how stripes develop on the flanks of the fish.

Wyoming Whites are currently thought to be “double-dose” carriers of the DaVinci gene; we’d shorthand it as Dv/Dv as breeders. A single-dose DaVinci is simply Dv/+, and is the gene responsible for the swirling bars of the fishes we now call Fancy Whites, Gladiators and Davinci’s (all are basically the exact same thing). In any case, mating two “Fancy Whites” together will yield rather predictable outcomes; 25% wild-type fish, 50% Fancy Whites, and 25% Wyoming Whites. By the same token, because Wyoming Whites are Dv/Dv, the hypothesis is that they must pass along a Dv gene to every one of their offspring.

Note, some companies separate out Wyoming Whites that develop “Black Ears” as a grade (the ears being black spots that develop at the top of the gill slit). On our locally produced Wyoming Whites, we don’t do that.  If you have a preference for fishes with “big ears”, “little ears”, or without “ears”, please ask, and we will attempt to accommodate such requests (but no promises are made)!