Bichirs and rope fish, advice from experienced keepers please!

[teddrummered]

Speaking to my local they say keep 1 elephant nose per tank. I dont usually go on advice from lfs but the fact that they diddnt try and sell me a few to make ££££ i am inclined to go with it!

My list as stands is.....

2 x senagal bichirs
3 x Ropefish
1 x Elephant nose fish
1 x butterfly fish
4 or 5 x congo tetras

That should keep me busy enough for a few weeks!

And a quick wikipedia search says they can all be found in or around the congo river! Perfect!

From what the shop has in stock I think I could be coming home with an elephant nose a butterfly and a few ropes or congo tetras this weekend! Nice!

(edit) They can get the bichirs in for next weekend!

Lets hope the ENF gets to keep his nose with hungry bichirs about haha!

Thanks again!

And yes there shall be pics of the beasties, I like to show off my critters, my axolotls turned out to be internet super stars after flashing a few pics and vids about!

 

[teddrummered]

Fingers crossed, buterfly fish and elephant nose should be with me on saturday and the bichirs should be with me on tuesday! Oh happy days! The Bichirs are around 3inches and £9 each, the butterfly fish is a big one and its £14 and the elephant noses are bout 6" and are £12 sounds good to me! The axolotls I used to keep were £25-£50 a pop!

Then just gotta keep an eye out for the ropes! My local had 16 of them in and diddnt sell a single one for a whole 4 months... untill last weekend when they sold the lot! Tis a shame coz the shop said they may not get any more for quite a while as they just werent selling.

Im sure I can track some down tho!

Thanks for all the help everyone, im glad everyone is in agreement that this is a good stocking number and suitable species, I was expecting a, NOOOOO overstocked! or NOOOOO that bichir will kill everything! I will get pics up at the soonest opportunity!

Thanks again, much respect!

Ed

 

[JamesF]

Butterflies are a strage fish. If the tank is too small, a female will eventually harass a male to death. Multiple males or females seem to be fine together. If you have a lot of floating plants you could try a female and 2 males.
African knives are also great fish. From what I know of the elephant nose, they swim in large schools in the wild, but in confined spaces, they fewer there are, the more aggressive they get to each other.

 

[lix.ma14]

NO more fish!! The tank is already getting overstocking!

 

[JamesF]

NO more fish!! The tank is already getting overstocking!

Nonsense. That tank is still lightly stocked. Even when all the fish are full grown it will only be moderately stocked. Weekly water changes and some easy to grow plants will keep everything extremely healthy for the fish.

 

[teddrummered]

Hi lix.ma14
The overstocking was the main thing i am concerned about as well as inter species agression thats why ive been after alot of help on this, to keep things as "safe" as possible i am ensuring I dont even get close to stocking limits (and why ive decided on an elephant nose instead of a black ghost as stays much smaller). I appreciate the concern but all the people so far who keep these fish assure me that my stocking is fine, even saying I can add more! The tank is 90gals with 2 large filters running and is full of plants, I wanted advice coz I have no idea how you deal with larger fish with the whole inches per gallon rules. All I know Is ive had 4 x 12inch and 1 x 15inch (yes i know its huge) axolotls in there and with the generous 4ft x 2ft floor space the tank always looked empty, never cramped or crowded and none of the fish (apart from the ropes) will get much bigger than the axolotls. (from the general stocking rule of axolotls it suggests I could have had 9 in there! In my opinion that is over stocked!) From what I gather bichirs and rope fish could end up just sitting in the caves and under cover the majority of the time so im guessing they wont use the swimming space very often so all the top levels will be for the elephant nose and butterfly! (I do agree that it might seem abit tight if they were all fully grown and all decided to get up and swim at the same time but from what I understand bichirs are very much the bottom dweller.) All sites ive been on suggest a 55gal for any of these fish and mines a 90gal so I really think im okay! Really do appreciate the concern tho Its nice to see people caring so much about these fishes well being!

Elephant nose will be 5-6inches the 2 bichirs are 3-4 inches and the butterfly is about 4 inches when I get them so the tank will look empty. Even if it ends up being that this tank is too small it is gonna take the fish quite a while to get to tank busting size! (havnt tracked down ropefish yet)

Will only get 1 butterfly to begin with as they are not easy to find and not cheap (only managed to track down 1) but very good to know all the same so thanks for that JamesF! Ive got a ton of duckweed and water hyacinth as floating plants so im sure theyll love it, the axolotls loved the long hairy beard like roots of the water hyacinth! Its a 4ft x 2ft surface area so im sure a 4-5 inch butterfly will be more than happy with it!

If anyone else is concerned about the stocking level let me know, after all this is exactly why I have been asking soo many questions but so far all replys point to "excellent choice of stocking" except for lix.ma14's above. I have always loved this tank for its minimal hassle set up (plants and rocks easily moved for cleaning and the sand is easy to keep spotless as everything just settles on top!) and I would like to keep it this way, weekly water changes are the norm but dont want a stocking level that requires 2 or 3 a week, that would just take all the fun out of it all and I really dont have the time for it (hence trying to be sensible with stocking)!

Thanks again, should be picking up the first of my new arrivals tomorrow!

Ed

 

[Spiritofthesoul]

Hey Ed, I totally agree with you about keeping the norm with water changes.
Doing 2~3x water change a week really takes the fun out of the hobby.

Anyway, when in doubt of stocking levels, I find AqAdvisor to be the most accurate stocking calculator available on the internet.

I did a calculation for you based on your latest stock list, guess what? Stocking level is exactly 100%.
Since you are having plants, the stock level should drop. How much? I don't know.

I can tell that you are serious about this hobby and those fishes will be well taken care off since you are asking so much.
Hope the fishes get a good life, and in return they would shine and give you joy in fishkeeping, cheers mate!

PS: To some point I can agree with lix.ma14, your tank is going to be overstocked. Thats because once you get addicted to polys, you are going to want more and more . Happen to me once. I thought I would be happy with 3 senegals in my 70g. Then I realise how awesome they are and upgraded to a 280g so that I can keep as many of them as I want.

 

[JamesF]

You should be pleasantly suprised by the activity of the senegals and ropes. It's uncommon for them to spend much time sitting still under cover. It's quite rare for me to look at my 50 gallon and not see at least one of the ropes swimming through the plants.