Back in black Xingu Rhomb

[Matteus]

When I was in elementary school I always wanted to get a snake. But my parents were both freaked out by them.

so I convinced them to let me get fish. I decide if I get fish I want something cool. Like a piranha! So I started doing my research and found out that red bellies were readily available and blacks were legendary, rare, expensive, mean, solo, and need a 100g tank for 1 fish. This made it my dream fish because it was waaay cooler than other stuff.

I burned through all the piranha books I could find and would basically know exactly every page that had blacks on them. I couldn’t get enough of them.

a few years later I found 2 in my lfs and managed to get them. And was radically disappointed when I tried to feed them my black convicts and the convicts killed the juvie rhombs.

a few days ago I just picked up this guy after conversing with the seller for a few months now. A local legend (in my eyes) decided he didn’t want this guy anymore. Needed room in his tanks, as I’m sure most of us understand. Lol.

 

[fishhead0103666]

So many different piranhas that so many people don’t know about, I can’t wait to see how these two grow Matteus. Nice pickup. Size?

 

[Matteus]

Thanks Brian.

it’s just one but I took a pic of both sides.

I would say it is exactly 8”, as it fit perfectly nose to tail into my 8” net when I put it in the tank. So I’d say it’s probably around 4-6 yr old.

it’s still getting aquatinted to its new home, so it still hasn’t eaten (5 days so far) yet, but it has been eating smelts previously. Once it starts eating again, I would like to stuff the smelts with pellets and then start seeing what I can get it eating.

I will eventually also like to get it socialized so it isn’t so shy and will hopefully eat when people are in the room. Right now it’s in our tv room so it sees us fairly often and our cats. I put awave maker in the tank for it to have a nice flow in the tank. I am seeing it swim into the flow then let the flow push it back so seems like it’s working so far.

 

[RD.]

Congrats on the new Rhomb, Matt!

 

[audiction]

beautiful xingu rhom matteus. i've tried almost every tropical fish you could buy but i always end up with piranhas. i actually get bored with all of them but piranhas are just amazing to me. regardless of personality...timid or aggressive i still enjoy all the piranha species. since your xingu is obviously in it's own tank starve it. some piranhas live 6 months in the wild if they get stuck by themselves in shallow muddy water during drought season. don't feed it for 2 weeks and you'll see that it would appreciate everything you give it. don't even try putting food inside the tank...just go straight 2 weeks. now obviously you can't do this to a pygo tank bec they will just kill each other. that's the advantage of having serrasalmus..you can go for days and not worry about anything. congrats and thanks for sharing your new baby and it was priced well...you basically stole it at that price.

 

[islandguy11]

Awesome Matt, I don't know anything about piranha (except that I'd prefer not to swim with them), but that's one fine (and mean) looking specimen. Maybe a stupid question but will it bite your hand if you put it in the tank?

 

[Matteus]

At this point it is more terrified of me than I am of it. I need to build trust with it before I would want to try anything funny. You know all about this with your aros.

a scared piranha is the most deadly, if it gets spooked it can shoot itself quite quickly and when they are frightened usually the jaws are snapping while scooting. So with the psi of their bite mixed with how sharp the interlocking teeth are, whatever it bites, there will be a hole exactly the shape of its mouth. I am more frightened of it biting the heater or wave maker cords than my hand.All that being said, I don’t believe it considers my hand as a food item (at this point). If a p is out of water, they often snap randomly and that is the most dangerous state, so I would never personally try to catch it with my bare hands.

I have been nicked a few times when I was a kid. The teeth are so sharp I didn’t even feel anything, but I will never forget the noise it made when it tagged me. Didn’t even realize where the blood was coming from lol.

 

[TheWolfman]

Very cool fish I always liked piranha, congrats on the pickup.

 

[Matteus]

So this guy has had a bad rap for being really shy before I got it. From the sounds of it, almost a year went by before it was ready to start being social for the previous owner.

After a few different attempts of things it seems as if I may have found a somewhat solution to it being so shy. I blocked out most of the light with duckweed and water lettuce.

now it even eats in front of me which I wasn’t even sure would ever happen. And the other day we had company and he grabbed a smelt in front of them as well.

I’m pretty stoked about this but just wondering what will happen with my move ?... not sure if I want to find a new home for it or what at this point. Will see how things pan out.

 

[tlindsey]

So this guy has had a bad rap for being really shy before I got it. From the sounds of it, almost a year went by before it was ready to start being social for the previous owner.

After a few different attempts of things it seems as if I may have found a somewhat solution to it being so shy. I blocked out most of the light with duckweed and water lettuce.

now it even eats in front of me which I wasn’t even sure would ever happen. And the other day we had company and he grabbed a smelt in front of them as well.

I’m pretty stoked about this but just wondering what will happen with my move ?... not sure if I want to find a new home for it or what at this point. Will see how things pan out.
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Hold on to that beautiful Rhom it will eventually start banging the glass lol.