African aro no more

[headbanger_jib]

i left this saturday to my home town, came back this monday evening and i go to the fish room to check, and i find my african dead and laying at the bottom of the tank.

when i left this saturday i fed him and he ate fine, he was just himself, nuthing unusual or anything. this really sucks as well as stumps me.

can anyone help me analyse what could have been the issue, although i think it could be starvation but just two days, i am in great doubt, this fish was got by me after a long long search.

i have kept it for more than a month, fed him twice a day, lives in a 120g.
along with some rasbora daniconus, and some albino bristle nose plecos.

this one was 2.5" in size, was being fed cut up frozen bloodworms and frozen artemia, substrate was shell sand, some cashew leaf litter. filtration at 2000lph, temp at 29deg C.

 

[Oddball]

Afaros don't start building any fat reserves until they reach the 6-8" range. Until then, they require constant access to food. I've posted the following in earlier threads. Hope it helps if you choose to raise another one.

Young ones don't require live food constantly. They require constant access to food. I raised them on dense culture crumbles, frozen bloodworms, and daphnia. Leftover foods made up the "constant" part of their feeding regimen. I raised them in bare tanks with sponge filters. The excess leftovers coated the surface of the sponge where the aro grazed until the next feeding. The sponges were cleaned out every other day to remove remaining leftovers before they could spoil.
This was the regimen until the aros reached about 8" and I was confident they'd begun to build sufficient fat reserves to go onto a regular feeding schedule.

The african arowana, Heterotis niloticus, is extremely time-consuming to keep alive as juvies in aquaria. They basically have to have access to food constantly until they reach about 8" and their bodies start holding reserve fat. These are filter feeding fish that can reach 3ft in length.
I kept mine going by keeping them in bare tanks with sponge filters. The sponge filters were beneficial in that they attracted food to their surface which the aros grazed on between feedings. Water chemistry is hard and alkaline with rift lake salts added to the tank. Water changes are every other day and sponge filters each are rinsed off on alternating days to keep spoiled food off the aros grazing areas. The tank receives direct sunlight to 1 side for an hour or 2 a day. The water is pretty green (to match their native waters).
Once the afaros reach a foot long, I'll probably move them from the 120s to the 360 and stop the sunlight/algae routine. Young can be kept together for only a short time before they become intolerant of each other and begin fighting. As sub-adults, they're tolerant of conspecifics again. I have other small growout species in with my young aros and they've never bothered them. These fish are active in all areas of the tank and are always on the move.
Foods consist of frozen bloodworms, mysis shrimp, brine shrimp plus, daphnia, cyclop-eeze, commercial dense culture crumbles, and mosquito larvae.
This is an awesome species if you can resolve yourself to being extremely busy on their maintenance for the first 6-8 months or so.

 

[headbanger_jib]

thank you for answering my question and confirming my doubts

i think i will follow a few of ur steps and yes i am going to try and raise one more for sure

 

[flamenco-t]

I started with 6 and now have 2 left. They're litterally eat today and die tmw. They're very fragile at young age. I feed mine frozen bloodworms 2-3 times per day.

They are time consuming, but I see growth that makes it worth my while

stan

 

[headbanger_jib]

i might be getting 3 of 'em
and this time i am gonna give 'em some more care than what i did last time

 

[ctoychik]

sorry to hear about your afro, man

never tried one myself, from Oddball's post seems like a really hard work this one ...

 

[yanfloist]

they are filter feeders, your going to need something like brine shrimp!! and feed them all the time!!
people make this mistake all the time. do hw before you get a african arowana.

 

[chesterthehero]

sand and black worms/live bloodworms were a life saver for my african.. shrimp pellets also helped since even once they mush apart they stay on the bottom of the tank

 

[phillydog1958]

small arowana are delicate. my lfs owner, who sold me my silver, always told me to never buy an arowana under 5 or 6 inches. he's critical of any lfs that sells arowana under 5 inches. my lfs guy is an asian breeder of arowana. he knows arowana. my question for you is, and it's rhetorical: i wonder how long before you got him, had your arowana lost its yolk sack? probably not very long . . . that's too young, unless one is very experienced with arowana.

 

[Gshock]

small arowana are delicate. my lfs owner, who sold me my silver, always told me to never buy an arowana under 5 or 6 inches. he's critical of any lfs that sells arowana under 5 inches. my lfs guy is an asian breeder of arowana. he knows arowana. my question for you is, and it's rhetorical: i wonder how long before you got him, had your arowana lost its yolk sack? probably not very long . . . that's too young, unless one is very experienced with arowana.

It's just afros that are hard when they are small, everything else is the same as it's bigger alternative...