Fish Story Aquarium and Rescue, Naples, FL; two 4500 gal 13'x13'x4.5'

[thebiggerthebetter]

November 2015 I saw Raymond Chan's stock and price list and was blown away. Among other interesting never-before-seen fish, I saw Catla catla for the first time ever, so I got one at 7"-8" at $90 (along with two Catlacarpio siamensis, same size and price).

I've never seen or heard of anyone keeping them before.

So it's been with me for 13 months. Grew slowly, my eyeball estimate today is 1', which makes for ~4"-5" in roughly a year. It appears to have a strong preference for being a filter feeder. Takes only pellets and any particulate matter in the water column. It has a huge mouth for a fish its size, twice bigger than the usual mouthiest predators, which again is typical for filter feeders having to channel a lot of water in their mouth.

Quirky fish, stands its own far better than say Catlacarpio against fin nippers and other opportunists and a better swimmer with a slimmer more hydrodynamic profile than the Catlacarpio. Catlacarpio are probably as laid back and timid as barbs go, not so with this guy - I've never seen it bother any fish but it is most usually intact.

Here is a video of the fish, who has been residing in 4500 gal from the start:

 

[thebiggerthebetter]

Wesley Wong graciously transferred his Tor khudree to me in Aug 2015. It was probably 20"-22". It's done well in one of my 4500 gal tanks. Pretty peaceful fish, at least I've not witnessed any aggression from it toward its very motley crew of tank mates. Neither have I seen any predatory behavior although its tank mates appear too big for it to even fathom an attack.

It's my biggest mahseer and a smart eating machine as all mahseers appear to be and an excruciatingly slow grower, again, as all mahseers appear to be. It looks like ~24" right now, both numbers being eyeball, in-tank estimates. It likes baitfish, cut and whole, too in addition of its staple pellets.

 

[celebrist]

Some of you know the story of this catfish that began here https://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=36790&hilit=mystus

When I got it in 2009-2010, I was ignorant and didn't even know I was getting a Hemibagrus. I thought it was a Mystus.

It's been very easy to feed. A good tank mate, nothing of the wyckii or wyckioides kind. Grew from 2" to 1' in about 1.5-2 years and stopped completely there. It's been 4 years or so since it remained the same size. They are farmed in Asia and it looks like my farm boy (or girl) is a cull, failing to reach its supposed max size of 2'+.

It's very relaxed and likes swimming around day or night and checking everything out. Quite active, again in complete opposition to wyckii and wyckioides.

In the 7 years I've had it, I saw it eat a 3" koi once when they were in a 1500 gal pond. Never before nor after has it done it, although it could. In the same pond I saw it chase other fish from its spot (that was ~3 years ago) but the spot was small and the chasing was not vicious and everyone complied anyway. Funny enough, it has not done the chasing ever before or after, again. It ate the koi exactly the same time. I think it had an episode. Maybe a teenage meltdown that came and went.

It has been in a 4500 gal for a year or more now, a model, upstanding citizen, not a scratch on it but never fighting anyone else. The activity you will see here is typical. It also takes rests in the center on the bottom in between these rather energetic swimming laps.

What is the fish around the 15 second mark?

 

[thebiggerthebetter]

Not obvious to me which fish you are referring to. I see Catla catla, umbee in the upper left corner, koi a bit in the back, and our biggest niger. Here are 14 sec, 15 sec, and 16 sec screenshots:

 

[celebrist]

Not obvious to me which fish you are referring to. I see Catla catla, umbee in the upper left corner, koi a bit in the back, and our biggest niger. Here are 14 sec, 15 sec, and 16 sec screenshots:

View attachment 1222414 View attachment 1222415 View attachment 1222416

I think it's the catla that I mistook for a Pacu the first time I watched that video

 

[thebiggerthebetter]

I got three mahseers from Ivan aka Aw3s0m3 the summer of 2016. Two of them Ivan labeled (apparently bought) as Thai golden mahseer but I am not finding any info on them on the net. Golden mahseer is Tor putitora. Thai mahseer is Tor tambroides, according to this nice site anyway: http://www.fly-fishing-in-thailand.com/the-fish.html

I don't know which species mine is. More on my ID woes in here https://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/...n-mahseer-in-4500-gal-14.680024/#post-7646332

This one is about 14", could have added about 1"-2" in my care. The other specimen is ~12" and has grown similarly too. Eat a ton, grow little. Typical. Love their pellets and baitfish.

 

[thebiggerthebetter]

Here is a video of a couple of rescued banded leporinus, which I have had for 1 year and for 1.5 years. I gathered they were a few years old, one was kept in a glistening 30 gal tank on a kitchen counter top and the other in a murky outside 200 gal pond. I got them at about 7"-8" and placed them in 4500 gal and they grew some, perhaps reaching ~10" currently.

They fought at first a little (for a day or two) to figure out who is who but the damage was pretty mild, some scales went flying, and never since have I seen this. They have been the most intact and completely damage-free fish in my very populated 4500 gal, which says a lot - no one touches them or those that want to can't catch them... and in all likelihood they do touch others as evidenced by nipped fins but being sneaky they appear to do so by night when we are not around...

They occur in large shoals in the wild, so it is not surprising that when one keeps a few of them, they enforce an hierarchy more rigorously and don't shoal as much (mine do swim in a relative proximity often though) and most regrettably they become fin nippers in a fashion that appears similar (to my ignorant and learning mind) to the behavior of many tetras and Co - fish lacking the comfort of a school of their kin turn into fin-nipping jerks.

It's my working hypothesis anyway. Feel free to argue pro or con.

Lone leporinus appear to indeed behave as smart jerks with some people, for example, reporting that they nip even the most threatening and aggressive fish like Hemibagrus wyckii and wyckioides in a 100-200 gal tank because the latter can't catch them to retaliate or to eat them. They are lighting fast and their vision is superb and apparently they do not sleep because otherwise they'd not survive. They'd not survive in my tank either if they slept, I reckon, because being so slim they'd fit in a mouth of many of their carnivorous tank mates. Plus I always leave a night light on.

As for their feeding habits, they are very nondiscriminatory, as described in literature. They are also smart and inquisitive albeit they do not care for who their owner and feeder is, IME anyway.

They are the smallest fish (as judged by their "swallowability") in the 4500 gal but the most relaxed and always intact, not a tiniest split in their finnage, that, counter-intuitively, it appears as if they are the bosses of the tank...

 

[thebiggerthebetter]

Here is a video featuring two of our five giant gouramies. The white one is ~22" and is called Tatushka and the grey one is named Oos, it's ~16". These and three red-tail gouramies ~12" each co-exist peacefully with each other in their 4500 gal. Occasionally their fins get tattered or split but it's likely from other tank mates.

Tatushka had a tough life. First it was tattooed against its will to improve the bottom line of its greedy and inhumane sellers. Then Tatushka got sold to a new owner who raised it in a tiny tank. It couldn't swim much in it and couldn't turn around well or hide when it needed to. So it sat in the corner by a side wall but because it was longer than the side wall, it had to adopt a letter "L" posture. Eventually over time this posture caused a 90 degree rigid turn in its backbone and a strong disfigurement to its snout and skull from the left side of its "face" being constantly pressed against the side wall. So its "face" has adopted a permanent curvature too.

Then Tatushka lucked out and got rescued by a guy who knew how to take care of it and was rehomed into a 240 gal tank. After years of free swimming its backbone straightened out but the "face" has not. The rescuer felt that even 240 gal was not big enough for it, so Tatushka became a second-time rescue and found its way into our tanks, where it's been around 3-4 years now.

Oos has not had it easy either and suffered some at our hands. I bought it at ~2" about 3 years ago. The first two years I've had problems with water in its enclosures, mostly with the hardness being too low (KH and GH 1-3 degrees) and unstable pH. As a result, Oos has developed skin sores several times in that time period and even at one point had to spend half a year outdoors in a natural pond. Finally, the last year it had a chance to reside in adequate water and to grow well.

Both ignore baitfish, cut or whole, entirely and focus on the offered dry feeds picking and choosing what their heart desires at that particular moment. It's almost funny to observe them intelligently checking out various pellets and freeze-dried cuisine like krill and plankton and as if hesitating and thinking "Do I really want this or should I hold out or search for something else? Maybe if I test-taste it… hmm… no, that tastes like refuse! You eat it yourself. I better check out that other stuff…" They like insects, that's for sure.

 

[thebiggerthebetter]

I bought two giraffe cats Auchenoglanis cf. Bouche last Spring of 2016 from a colleague of ours. They came in at ~6" and thus have added about 10" in 8 months. Their coloration is similar but one is usually much lighter colored than the other. I don't readily detect any other differences. The growth rate and temperament and behavior are about the same.

Needless to say they love their food and are never hungry, although one cannot tell this from their zealous feeding habits.

I am currently growing out 7 Auchenoglanis to try and ID them more firmly when they are larger:

- 2 Bouche
- 1 from Congo (should be wittei); WetSpot
- 1 from beetlebug515 that looks much like the Congo; named Happy
- 1 from Niger (WetSpot)
- 1 from Volta (WetSpot)
- 1 unknown, also from WetSpot, sold as occidentalis but it is not; it looks closest to Volta but we'll see

Anyhow, here are two videos on the Bouche's:

This is the lighter-colored one. Of course, it decided to embarrass me by flicking a couple of times, showing I need to care for them better

This is the darker one:

 

[thebiggerthebetter]

I got four Rio Meta pbass from Wes in Aug 2015 and a bit later two Xingu pbass. They were about 2"-3" and have grown today to ~16" for the Xingu pair and 10"-16" for the Meta. I am a Cichla newbie and these were pretty much my first Cichla.

I was given another pbass by Joe of Joefish Aquatics, Ft. Myers, FL about half a year ago at ~3". Joe thought it could have been caught in FL but we can't be sure at all. A customer brought it and one 6" temensis to Joe's LFS one day. His name is Nabaldashnik. It has grown very well and reached ~1' currently.

They all learned to take baitfish and pellets after having been fasted several days to a week from the get go.

Here are two videos of them in 4500 gal (the second video is focused only on the unknown pbass):