Bichir/Barb and more compatibility question.

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
In the daytime everything gets along fine, but at night polys (polies?, pollies? this spelling never really made since) really go to town on small fish. As far as water goes think you're fine but the only smaller fish that are gonna last in there long-term are the SRC, the pleco, and maybe congo tetras (they get to like 6 inches and are pretty fast). I'd actually be a bit cautious with the SRC, for the poly;s sake. A 13 inch senegalus tried to eat my 2 inch SRC, and it died a couple days after I took them both out of the water and removed the cat from its throat. How big is it? Once it's about 5 inches (they're pretty girthy) no poly would even try to eat it.
No worries with the Raphael Cat. The biggest del is maybe 3-4”, the Raphael cat is 2-3”. No way they would mistake him for a snack, even as big of gluttons as they are.
 
Seems like things have calmed down. The Odessa have claimed the corner by the diffuser, and while I initially saw one picking on a del, I also saw the del snap back, and I believe they’re settling into their own territories.
That said, I’m pretty sure keeping them all together once the polys are grown is a fantasy.
Guess that just means I need to set up another tank in a year or two....bummer.
The pleco and catfish are totally fine with the polys. I don’t see any issue developing there.
Maintenance is a pain tho. I used aquaterra ruby sand for it, it looks beautiful, but I’d bet it’s loaded with silicates because I’m having to wipe diatoms off the java fern and vacuum the sand almost every day.
Got a pack of phosguard in the filter sock now to suck up the silicates. I’d forego that and let the tank cycle naturally, but I’m still fighting diatom in my three guppy tanks that I’ve had running for over a year. So it’s in my well water as well. The sand has definitely made an annoyance into a plague though.
This is off topic but I began this thread asking for advice...
Anyone have experience with phosguard or similar ferric oxide products?
Thoughts? Advice?
 
Man I wish congos got to 6". You'll be lucky if the males hit 4" and females 3".
This.


I got one of the dels I have from magpie magpie she was 12" when I got her and was raised with congos no issues.
Ive had bristle nose in with mine no issues.
I already had the Congos in the tank when I added my polys, and they were pretty big at 3" or so when I added the polys, so I'm not sure if that helped or not?

I got the Del at 6" and she grew up with them. She was always a very mellow fish, though. I was able to trust her when I added a small Teug - the Teug was 2-3" and she was 9-10ish". She would also just hang out with the Kuhli loaches, just chilling. So I'm not sure how much was the order/size of things when I did it vs. the individual fish. She is WC which would make me think she'd be more predatory however they are not huge hogs like CB fish are, so maybe that's a factor?

But none of my polys bothered any fish in the tank excepting the poor Kuhlis (impossible for me to remove from my heavily planted tank.)

I also wonder if the dense plants helped as the polys on the bottom weren't seeing a lot of movement above them at night? Totally guessing. Might just be that I was lucky.

Here's a pic of Udon with the tiny Teug. * Don't try this at home unless you know your fish * ;)
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I have both a delhezi and a Senegal in a 125. They are both super peaceful, but if it fits in their mouths, consider it gone at night.

I tried adding 10 green barbs in my tank a while ago, and they all dissapeared In less than a week! All while still feeding pellets, shrimp and tilapia.

That being said, small cichlids ( 1" - 2") like convicts and firemouths have no issues somehow.
 
Oh absolutely. It’s like I look away for five minutes and next time I look, one will look like it swallowed a marble. The sen isn’t so bad the but dels are pigs.


Cb dels are garbage cans. Id under feed these guys a bit. No need to really feed daily. My old cb del literally ate itself to death. She only lasted 3 yrs. Others report the same behavior. The fish would literally gorge itself and eat way more than the larger wc polys. D dmd had a similar issue with his teugelsi
 
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