South American tank project

[Fiber]

Hello

I have a project in mind for a biotope aquarium with fishes from the Rio Negro (Brasil) with dimensions 16' x 5' x3' (in this order of magnitude)
I will take the necessary procedures to obtain a certificate of compétence to maintain freshwater stingrays. I would like to have a pair of potamotrygon motoro or potamotrygon schroederi. I would also like to have some cichlids (hoplarchus psittacus, uaru amphiacanthoides and If possible crenicichla marmorata). If possible I would like to add some characins (boulengerella maculata, chalceus erythrurus) and some pimelodids (calophysus macropterus, brachyplatystoma tigrinum and leiarius pictus) and loricariids (panaque nigrolineatus, peckoltia sabaji)
It would give something like:
- 1/1 potamotrygon motoro/schroederi
- 1 crenicichla marmorata
- 4 hoplarchus psittacus
- 6 uaru amphiacanthoides
- 4 boulengerella maculata
- 6 chalceus erythrurus
- 1 calophysus macropterus
- 1 brachyplatystoma tigrinum
- 1 leiarius pictus
- 1 panaque nigrolineatus
- 4 peckoltia sabaji
Thank you for your tips to see what is feasible ans what is not

 

[Deadeye]

Welcome to the forum!
Sounds like you’ve got it all figured out! Can’t wait to see it made!

 

[MultipleTankSyndrome]

Welcome to MonsterFishKeepers, Fiber! Hope you like it here.
That sounds like a very interesting setup for the most part, my input below.

- 1 crenicichla marmorata
- 4 hoplarchus psittacus
-4 boulengerella maculata
- 6 chalceus erythrurus
- 4 peckoltia sabaji

You may run into issues if you keep these with the listed catfish. I would expect the sailfin pictus catfish to be capable of making a meal out of everything listed here (because of its size and wide mouth), and the plecos, characins, and even pike cichlids may fall victim to the vulture catfish/shovelnose catfish.
So it could be tried, but at the very least it wouldn't hurt to have rehoming accomodations and/or extra tanks at the ready for fish who don't get along.

 

[..puSkar..]

Interesting stock. Eager to see how it turns out.
duanes Rocksor

 

[Rocksor]

For reference, I don't see a 14" vulture catfish eating a 6" TL marmorata. A year old 6" lugubris pike is pretty thick, body height is roughly 1.5 adult fingers put together. The 6" marm would a bit too thick for it's mouth to be even attempted. At 3 years old, a marm would be pretty close to the thickness of an adult wrist and close to the length of an adult foreman.

 

[MultipleTankSyndrome]

My concern with the vulture catfish is not swallowing the pike, it is taking chunks out of the pike and similarly sized fish. I think thebiggerthebetter made some videos/threads about how they can bite chunks from other fish, and the fish in question were similar to the pike in relative size to the vulture catfish.

 

[thebiggerthebetter]

Vultures dispose of dead fish and may attack a fish in distress, even that is selective IME. They do not seem to pay any mind to healthy tank mates.

 

[MultipleTankSyndrome]

I see.

For Fiber, what thebiggerthebetter said would rectify my vulture catfish concern. You should be fine to have it in there.

 

[thebiggerthebetter]

There are caveats. Like the tank size matters. Fish sizes matter. Kolt's koltsixx trachy trachy was attacked by his vulture without a reason that him and I could see. The difference between our experience involved tank size hundreds gallons versus thousands. It still seems a rare attack, I don't recall reading of another, nor seen anything like that in our hands that vultures would attack a calm healthy tank mate.

 

[WOLF2013]

Vultures dispose of dead fish and may attack a fish in distress, even that is selective IME. They do not seem to pay any mind to healthy tank mates.

Agreed. I have a trio of vulture catfish and they do not attack anyother fish. Their reputation as being aggressive catfish is misleading and often false.
In the wild, they attack dead fish and fish that are weak and dying just like piranhas do.