Frontosa as a clean up crew

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R

rudy

Polypterus
MFK Member
Jan 25, 2006
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A lot of times when I feed my rays I will get a bit of a mess from excess food. I was over at a guys house last night that had a single frontosa in there with his rays and says that it works extremely well. I have also seen it done a few times here so thought I would ask what people thought of the idea. My pond is 400 gallons and there are the trio of rays and a small pleco, so I doubt with the 4 FX5s as filtration I would have a bioload issue

The frontosa was not only effective, but incredibly nice looking and thought that it would be a good edition to my new ray tank when it is built as it will be a wall tank so will be 30 inches high.

Thanks for your help
 
Hey Tim i have also thought about this for a very long time, have the same problem with alot of rays in a tank and constantly cleaning out the scraps with a net. The only reason i didnt do it yet was my concern for the fish to interfere with there breeding habits, I know it most likely wont happen but at the same time i don't want to change anything when i'm lucky enough to be getting pups at the moment. If anyone else has some real knowledge about this please supply the info.
 
Fronts are a nice slow moving non aggressive fish, would use a female, for the smaller size, the fronts may not flourish with the softer water, but it would not injure them either.

Would not mix males and females, they could try to breed and become aggressive. I think two or three small females would be a nice cleanup crew.
 
We use frontosas as a cleanup crew in the Mega tank. And it works great. But expect a loss ones in a while specially with very big rays.
Regards
Frank
 
i have also used fontosa with no problems

i dont know how the fontosa would be if they were breeding
 
I get the female comment, however here's the catch. A buddy has a 12 inch male Zaire that is very, very docile. He is in a 33 gallon so in need of rescue.

Any problems would you think?
 
Well, I have no facts to support this, but I like the idea. You have more than enough filtration, always a good idea with rays. I don't think it would affect your bioload, maybe it would actually improve it because you won't have all the small bits of decaying food around the tank. I think some people here use fire eels for this. Plus, I know a species only tank is ideal most of the time, but I think rays look nice with other fish. And yes, I agree with you on getting a 12 inch fish out of a 30 gallon tank ASAP! Give it a try and watch it closely at first. If theres a problem, I don't think you'll have a hard time getting someone to take a big frontosa off your hands; lots of people would love to have that fish.
 
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