Electric eel

[thaiho]

 

[thefredpit]

that is so cool

 

[Hendre]

I want to do something similar with my xenomystus, just a much much lower voltage of course

 

[J. H.]

I want to do something similar with my xenomystus, just a much much lower voltage of course

If you have an old set of speakers with an amplifier, cut off the 3.5mm input jack, strip the wires a little, maybe solder them to some metal plates, and stick them in your tank. If you get it to work right, you will be able to hear every time your knives give off a pulse. A little more work and you can replace the speakers with lights. You can't run the system directly off your knives, because they are not as powerful as this eel, but with an amplifier it would work.

 

[Hendre]

Shouldn't you be worried with metal toxicity? It sounds cool though!

 

[J. H.]

Shouldn't you be worried with metal toxicity? It sounds cool though!

You probably should, but if you only put it in the tank when you want to use it...
Anyway, steel isn't an issue as far as I know, definitely not stainless, so if you used that for the contacts, it should be fine.

 

[blackbullhead]

Notopterids, including Xenomystus, don't actually have electric organs like Gymnotiformes or mormyrids do.

 

[Troy1015]

Dloks

 

[Hendre]

Notopterids, including Xenomystus, don't actually have electric organs like Gymnotiformes or mormyrids do.

So no electrosensory capabilities?

 

[blackbullhead]

So no electrosensory capabilities?

They are electroreceptive, so they can pick up on the weak electric fields emitted by other organisms, but do not generate an electric signal like SA knifefishes or mormyroids use for communication and "visualizing" their surroundings.