My thorichthys helleri tank and hello

[adamsfishes]

Thanks, I really appreciate your thorough responses. You actually answered more questions I had. I was wondering what plants might be appropriate, and I like your choices here.

Since you seem to know a lot about these fish, where does the aureus fall on the aggression spectrum? I definitely want a peaceful fish so would only consider them if they are comparable to the helleri in that regard.

The swordtails look nice. Are they the only livebearers you keep or do you also have mollies? I'm not really sure what other fish beyond those two are found with helleris in the wild.

Your meeki and helleri tanks are both stunning...

 

[adamsfishes]

Do you mind showing a wide shot of your planted meeki tank?

 

[Stanzzzz7]

Thanks, I really appreciate your thorough responses. You actually answered more questions I had. I was wondering what plants might be appropriate, and I like your choices here.

Since you seem to know a lot about these fish, where does the aureus fall on the aggression spectrum? I definitely want a peaceful fish so would only consider them if they are comparable to the helleri in that regard.

The swordtails look nice. Are they the only livebearers you keep or do you also have mollies? I'm not really sure what other fish beyond those two are found with helleris in the wild.

Your meeki and helleri tanks are both stunning...

Thanks glad you like them.

Thorichthys aureus is about the same as helleri in terms of aggression. Like helleri they do well in cooler clean water around 74.
They are also sensitive to nitrates so good aquarium maintenance is needed to see them at their best. I would recommend you change at least 50% of the tanks volume per week.

Regarding the livebearers. I only keep the swordtails with mine.i prefer tanks with not to many species in.However there is no reason you could not keep other livebeares such as poecilia species or goodieds. There is also the pike top livebearer if you fancy something a bit different to occupy the upper levels of the tank.
You could also keep catfish such as rhamdia quelen.There are also characins from the astyanax family like astyanax mexicana.
These characins are quite hard to come across but beunos aires tetra are a very close match if you don't mind cheating a little.

 

[Stanzzzz7]

Do you mind showing a wide shot of your planted meeki tank?

Have a look at my thread titled lots of pics past and present. There are lots of pictures of my meeki and helleri tank plus a few others.

 

[adamsfishes]

Yeah, swordtails are a nice choice. I'm not a big fan of characins... mollies and goodieds don't really excite me either.

Are there any smaller cats in this habitat? The Rhamdia is a great looking fish, but it looks like it gets really big.

If the tank was big enough, do you think Thorichthys would mix ok with some Cryptoheros nanoluteus? I would lean toward a single cichlid species based on what I know now, but the nano is one fish I might consider because it's smaller and also relatively peaceful, plus it looks great.

 

[Stanzzzz7]

There are no other native cats in this habitat that I am aware of.
You may find plecs of some sort are quite common, but these have been introduced by man and are not endemic to the biotope in question.You may also find goby fish species but they are seldom if ever available.
If the tank was big enough I see no reason for not keeping a Cryptoheros species.
I used to keep a pair of spilurum with my meeki.
They can also be found in the same waters.

 

[adamsfishes]

Thanks. Sorry to bug you with so many questions.

The spilurum is nice looking. I really dig vertical stripes on fish though for whatever reason. I think I'm one of the few people that thinks wild discus look better.

 

[Stanzzzz7]

That's OK,glad to be of help.
I agree about the discus.I always prefer wild type fish rather than line bred colour morphs.

 

[adamsfishes]

Do you have any experience with the Thorichthys socolofi? Looking at more fish today and found this little guy.

Nice article about it here:
http://www.practicalfishkeeping.co.uk/content.php?sid=2972

Looks a lot like the helleri, only smaller, less yellow, and apparently even more peaceful.

There are a couple threads around from a while back where it was sold at one point and someone was breeding them, so they are out there somewhere...

 

[Stanzzzz7]

The only experience I have with this fish is searching for them and never finding any.
I have wanted to keep socolofi for years but have never came across any.
If you do find any, take note of what it says in the article about feeding.I have heard of many thorichthys keepers loosing fish to bloat.
I am no expert on bloat,but I know a lot of people who feed bloodworm have lost fish to bloat.I avoid feeding it to any of my thorichthys, although thorichthys from the meeki group may be better equipped to handle it.
I also give mine a little broccoli to help digestion.Although the fish are predominantly carnivorous, I imagine they would scoop up a little algae, or insects gut loaded with some kind of plant matter.My helleri are keen to eat it but some my turn it down.
Good luck in finding these fish,I'm sure they are great to keep.