florida gar and oscar

[xander]

spatula, gar keeper was not cool. he fed his gar KFC. man what a moron. lol.

anyways, look guys, xander does have some bad tank mates. but he is prepared.
If ur new u should NEVER try a dangerous mix. When u have experience with gar u can try some of these combos. u have to be careful and what we are tryin to tell u guys is this is a very dangerous combo, not one of the combos that are a maybe combo but a combo that is truly dangerous. Try it if you want but WHEN ur gar is attacked or back is broken or something along thos lines dont come cryin to us. try it if u want but u have been warned

spatula is gar keeper...

DVS i am NOT the big gar keeper, in fact i just narrowly escaped giving up on gar....i am in the process of typing out my thought process before going ahead with my current combination.

 

[xander]

if i remember correctly also you were the same person that told me dont put my pbass with gars, why did you do it though? i dont want to start an argument but would like hear your explanation on here since it seems like your the big gar keeper around here

snakeheads
they were 9" and supposedly the more docile species, reputed to be more community than anything else. but mainly, they were 9" and way too small to be noticed by the gars. in fact, it's probably a mark of how docile my cubans are compared to others that they didn't eat them. the smelt i feed them is actually larger than some of their uhm, "temporary" tankmates. i also actually know a few people who keep adult pleurothalma with small fish and also cuban gars, don't think it would have been too bad of a combination. but these were actually in the big tank cause they were killing the small fish inthe growout, i was really resigned to the fact that the gars were gna eat them, so i was really pleasently suprised when that didn't happen.

current pbass
i actually gave this a whole hell of a lot of thought, hard to explain in a few paragraphs. but here goes.

1.pbass are usually much more aggressive and boisterous in packs, i specifically kept a small number to prevent this. i actually test ran it with one pb, it was mostly scared by the gars and never eats as boisterously, in fact the gars have been spooked out tonnes more times by my african arowana then my pbass. when it worked, i went ahead with 2 pbass, which seems to be as timid as 1. the moment i feel the gars are getting freaked by any excessive splashing i'd get rid of the pbass thou...

2. more importantly, cubans are atractostues, and much more able to hold their own. a while back i had a dat and barramundi in for a short while, the cubans were not affected at all but even the 18" florida gars were much more skittish. i really don't think it's so much of the size of the cubans that is responsible for my so far success with keeping this combi but rather more of their aggressive, sturdy nature. in fact while looking for past examples of this combi i found that more reputable guys such as chad over at ap had this combi, and since most gar gurus had not seemed too concerned i wasn't too concerned. so basically imo it's alright to have 1 or 2 smaller pbass with larger atractosteus sp gar as it's far more likely that they're going to pick on the pbass rather than the other way round. with lepisosteus gars however, it's probably a bad idea. they seem to display much more skittish behaviour. but that's just my opinion...i'm probably going to be proven wrong soon

3. why not oscars then, i had one(terrible, stupid mistake) for a day and it terrorised my cubans, and it was barely 15"....perhaps it leaves the smaller fl gars alone as it doesn't see them as a threat to it's territory..lol

 

[dvsgp6]

spatula is gar keeper...

DVS i am NOT the big gar keeper, in fact i just narrowly escaped giving up on gar....i am in the process of typing out my thought process before going ahead with my current combination.

snakeheads
they were 9" and supposedly the more docile species, reputed to be more community than anything else. but mainly, they were 9" and way too small to be noticed by the gars. in fact, it's probably a mark of how docile my cubans are compared to others that they didn't eat them. the smelt i feed them is actually larger than some of their uhm, "temporary" tankmates. i also actually know a few people who keep adult pleurothalma with small fish and also cuban gars, don't think it would have been too bad of a combination. but these were actually in the big tank cause they were killing the small fish inthe growout, i was really resigned to the fact that the gars were gna eat them, so i was really pleasently suprised when that didn't happen.

current pbass
i actually gave this a whole hell of a lot of thought, hard to explain in a few paragraphs. but here goes.

1.pbass are usually much more aggressive and boisterous in packs, i specifically kept a small number to prevent this. i actually test ran it with one pb, it was mostly scared by the gars and never eats as boisterously, in fact the gars have been spooked out tonnes more times by my african arowana then my pbass. when it worked, i went ahead with 2 pbass, which seems to be as timid as 1. the moment i feel the gars are getting freaked by any excessive splashing i'd get rid of the pbass thou...

2. more importantly, cubans are atractostues, and much more able to hold their own. a while back i had a dat and barramundi in for a short while, the cubans were not affected at all but even the 18" florida gars were much more skittish. i really don't think it's so much of the size of the cubans that is responsible for my so far success with keeping this combi but rather more of their aggressive, sturdy nature. in fact while looking for past examples of this combi i found that more reputable guys such as chad over at ap had this combi, and since most gar gurus had not seemed too concerned i wasn't too concerned. so basically imo it's alright to have 1 or 2 smaller pbass with larger atractosteus sp gar as it's far more likely that they're going to pick on the pbass rather than the other way round. with lepisosteus gars however, it's probably a bad idea. they seem to display much more skittish behaviour. but that's just my opinion...i'm probably going to be proven wrong soon

3. why not oscars then, i had one(terrible, stupid mistake) for a day and it terrorised my cubans, and it was barely 15"....perhaps it leaves the smaller fl gars alone as it doesn't see them as a threat to it's territory..lol

thanks for the explanation xander, im not here on this site to tell others what to do or what kind of fish to put with other fish because if that was the case then more than 50% of the members on here would be doing bad fish keeping because usually they mix fish with others that are not be kept together but do and EXTREMELY well job of maintining and bringing them up to there full potential because thats what MFK is all about. i am just here to say if a member has had success keeping an oscar with a gar (like me for almost 2 years) i have my input to tell that member hey give it a try it has work for me maybe would work for you and i know there is plenty of people that have kept this combo and many other rare combos with gars with success. Like you xander you are one of those members that has kept gars(cubans rare) with other type of fish with success.

 

[xander]

thanks for the explanation xander, im not here on this site to tell others what to do or what kind of fish to put with other fish because if that was the case then more than 50% of the members on here would be doing bad fish keeping because usually they mix fish with others that are not be kept together but do and EXTREMELY well job of maintining and bringing them up to there full potential because thats what MFK is all about. i am just here to say if a member has had success keeping an oscar with a gar (like me for almost 2 years) i have my input to tell that member hey give it a try it has work for me maybe would work for you and i know there is plenty of people that have kept this combo and many other rare combos with gars with success. Like you xander you are one of those members that has kept gars(cubans rare) with other type of fish with success.

see the reason i posted what i did is because the combinations(gar + oscar OR gar + pbass) are more likely too end in disaster rather than success. if the combination is working out, then we are the exception rather than the rule. i very carefully monitor my fish for about 6 hours a day to ensure that everything is okay, even at night i spend an hour or 2 monitoring them in the dark. but if i were to go around saying "this has worked for me, try it", many more people would attempt the combo but how many do you think will succeed? how many more would end up with beaten up gars. which is why even now if you were to ask me on my opinion if you should try mixing pbass with gar i would say no as it is simply not a very good mix. dont give advise based on the exceptions(gar working with pbass/oscar) rather than the rule(more often the combi not working out, and resulting in one or more fishes getting hurt) as it would result in more people trying it, and probably failing. if you somehow manage to successfully do it then great, but i wouldn't suggest encouraging others to do the same.

 

[Noddy]

I aggree with Xander.
I started out with a very gentle, easy going and sweet Oscar.
Very docile and never showed any real aggression.
That's what made me decide I could "try" it.
I guess my Oscar is an exception to the Oscar-rule and any other O might have given problems.
But now I got 2 gentle fish that eat out of my hand and the combo works for me, but I still cannot advise other people to "try"the combo, for trouble may be just around the corner.
Same here on the infinite hours of observation to make sure things would work out!