The blood parrot cichlid

What a blood parrot is

The blood parrot cichlid (in Chinese 血鸚鵡, xuè yīngwǔ) is a man-made hybrid of Central American cichlids. It has a deep, rounded body, large eyes and a small, beak-shaped mouth that gives the fish its name. Most are orange to red, and a well-fed adult can be almost glowing.

It is not a species, it has no wild population, and it doesn’t have a scientific name of its own. In stores you will see it sold as blood parrot, red parrot, parrot cichlid or simply parrot. It has nothing to do with the saltwater parrotfish.

Taiwan, the 1980s and the parentage argument

The blood parrot is usually traced to breeders in Taiwan in the mid-1980s, with 1986 the year most often given. It reached Western shops by the early 1990s; Practical Fishkeeping recalls parrots first appearing in its UK advertisements around 1993. Its commercial success showed Asian breeders that a cichlid nature never made could sell very well, and within a decade Malaysian breeders were using parrots in the crosses that became the flowerhorn.

What went into it is another matter. The Taiwanese breeders never published their crosses, and the answer you get depends on the source:

• Midas cichlid × redhead cichlid. The most common modern answer. Wikipedia and iNaturalist list Amphilophus citrinellus crossed with the redhead, Vieja melanurus (long sold as synspilum).
• Severum × Midas or red devil. The story told when parrots first hit the market. Some Asian exporters still label them Heros severus × Amphilophus citrinellus, and many retailers repeat it.
• A mix of several. Aquarium Co-op lists the Midas, redhead and red devil as suspected parents, and hobby breeders describe modern parrots as layered crosses with a dwarfing body mutation bred in.
• A mutated single species. A writer in Tropical Fish Hobbyist once argued that parrots may be heavily mutated, balloon-bodied forms of a single species, most likely the Midas.

The Midas and redhead explanation is the one most current references favor, but nobody outside those original farms can say for sure, and today’s parrots have very likely been crossed further since.

The mouth, the body and how to feed them

The parrot’s signature look comes with real limitations. Its mouth is a small, vertical, triangular opening that cannot fully close. The fish can’t bite down hard, so it compensates by sucking food in and crushing it in the throat. Many also have a compressed spine, a notch or dip in the forehead, and in some fish a misshapen swim bladder that makes swimming look awkward.

None of that stops a parrot from living a long life, but it changes feeding:

• Size the food to the mouth. Juveniles need baby or micro pellets, and adults do best on small pellets, not the big sticks sold for oscars and flowerhorns.
• Floating or slow-sinking. Parrots scoop food from the surface or mid-water more easily than they pick it off gravel. If you use sinking food, a bare or smooth bottom helps.
• Soften hard foods. Many keepers find soaking pellets for a minute before feeding makes them easier to take in and cuts down on the swallowed air that can lead to floating problems.
• Watch who gets fed. In a mixed tank, faster fish with normal mouths can take everything. A parrot with a pinched belly is losing that race.
• Treats. Frozen bloodworms, brine shrimp and mysis, or shelled peas, a few times a week.

Two small meals a day that disappear in a minute or two is plenty for an adult. The same rules that apply to flowerhorns, covered in feeding, apply here: overfeeding pollutes the water long before it grows a better fish.

Red color depends on diet. Good parrot foods use natural carotenoids such as astaxanthin, and a parrot fed on them holds color well. Occasionally a parrot gets gravel wedged in its mouth; a smooth, rounded substrate or sand avoids that.

Dyed, tattooed and heart parrots

This is the ugly side of the parrot trade, and every buyer should know it. Some farms artificially color parrots, selling them as jellybean, bubblegum, cotton candy or purple parrots in blues, greens and pinks that no parrot grows naturally.

• How it is done. Fish are injected with dye or have their slime coat stripped and are dipped in it. Shapes and patterns are tattooed on with needles or lasers.
• What it costs the fish. Both methods are reported to kill many fish, and survivors can be more vulnerable to infection. The color fades, often within six to nine months.
• Heart or love parrots. These are made by cutting off the tail fin so the body reads as a heart shape. The fish lives on without a caudal fin.

Hobby magazines have campaigned against the practice for decades. Practical Fishkeeping began asking UK retailers to stop selling dyed fish in 1996, and the RSPCA calls it cruel. Many retailers now refuse these fish.

How to spot one: neon colors that don’t exist on any undyed parrot, blotchy or patterned color that stops abruptly, printed shapes, or a tail that ends in a stump. Natural parrot colors are red, orange, yellow, white (platinum or snow white) and black-and-white panda patterns. If a seller offers a heart-shaped parrot, look for a full tail fin. If it isn’t there, it was cut.

Setting up and caring for blood parrots

Parrots are hardy and forgiving, which is part of their appeal. They are still messy, hungry cichlids that reach softball size.

• Tank. 30 gallons for a single parrot, 55 for two or three, and 75 gallons or more for a group of five or six. Longer tanks beat taller ones.
• Filtration. Aim for filters rated well above the tank size. Canisters or large hang-on-back filters work well.
• Water. 76 to 82°F (24 to 28°C), pH around neutral, zero ammonia and nitrite, and nitrate kept low with 25 to 30 percent water changes weekly. More in water and temperature.
• Decor. Caves, clay pots and smooth rock. Young parrots are skittish and hide a lot, and a parrot with nowhere to retreat stays stressed and pale. Expect them to dig and rearrange.
• Lid. Parrots are less prone to jumping than flowerhorns, but a lid is cheap insurance.

New parrots often sulk for a few days, and many darken or show black patches when stressed or after a move. Those usually fade as the fish settles. Patches that spread along with clamped fins, rubbing or appetite loss are a water quality warning, not a color change. Test the water first, then check flowerhorn and cichlid diseases.

Pairs will clean a flat stone, lay eggs and guard them fiercely. With an infertile male the eggs turn white within a day or two. Leave them for a few days or remove them; either is fine.

Tank mates

Blood parrots are cichlids with cichlid attitudes: they claim a cave and chase anything that comes near it. Their mouths just limit the damage they can do. The goal is tank mates too big to eat, calm enough not to bully, and not so fast they take all the food.

Add everyone at once if you can, and rearrange the decor if you add later. The question of flowerhorns specifically is covered in flowerhorn vs blood parrot; the short answer is no.

Parrot relatives worth knowing

The blood parrot has spun off a family of premium types. The King Kong parrot is larger with a better-working mouth. The Kirin parrot brings in flowerhorn color. Platinum and panda parrots are natural color forms, and extra-round Yuan Bao or ingot parrots are prized in Asia. Pet Zone ships blood parrots and their relatives nationwide from flowerhorn.co. For the bigger picture on crosses like these, see hybrid cichlids explained.