Jan,

This is a merchandizing misnomer. Comet sounds more exotic than Common
goldfish. Most feeders are just plain common goldfish. For the fish to be
an official Comet the tail must be at least three quarters the length of the
body to one and one half the body length. The longer the better. In the
30's some were bred with tails that were twice the fishes body length.

The Comet is a distinct American Variety of Goldfish and the rest in the
feeder tank are just common Goldfish. Over the years though the name comet
just seemed to migrate to any single tailed long bodied fish, which is
wrong. While you are looking in the feeder tank look for a Goldfish with a
long ribbon like tail. The tail on this fish is long, no fork and looks
like a wide piece of Ribbon tailing the fish. Some feeder breeders are
getting some of these fish. These too were popular in the 40's and were the
original Ribbon-tailed Goldfish. Ribbon-tails were suppose to be at least
one and one half the body length of the fish. Walt Disney was intralled
with these fish and if your watch Fantasia you will see them as the Goldfish
in the Arabian Dance.

HTH

Tom L.L.
========================
"~ jan JJsPond.us" wrote in message
...
I may be wrong, but I thought all feeder goldfish were comets. Then there
are sarassas (sic), shubunkins (2 different varieties), fantails (many
different varieties) and walkings. Not sure that really covers the all the
goldfish groups or not, maybe someone else can list them? ~ jan


On Mon, 17 Nov 2003 10:00:40 -0500, "BenignVanilla"
wrote:

The water in Shareholders Pond has been quite clear lately, as I have not
been touching it at all. Anyway, we were watching the fish yesterday, and
noticed that one of the goldies we had thrown in months ago, had a very
long
flowing tail. It's a bit thinner then the other guys, which are quite the
chubbos...I think this guy is a comet.

See my ponds thru the seasons and/or my filter design:
http://users.owt.com/jjspond/

~Keep 'em Defrosted~
Tri-Cities, WA Zone 7a
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