Heroina isonycterina
- Thread starter ryansmith83
- Start date
The Heroina have been here for just over two weeks. I put a basic fluorescent strip light on the tank tonight and made a video. It's a cheap GE soft white bulb from Lowe's. I'm amazed at how yellow they look under the light. This was about 30 seconds after I finished a water change and fed them some frozen krill, so excuse all the stuff floating around.
There isn't much to report at this point except that they're still very pushy and aggressive with each other. As you can see, the fins are a bit tattered. They actually healed over from the shipping but have now been damaged by their tankmates. I moved a bellycrawler pike into their tank tonight and they've been trying to give him hell, but he's quickly putting them in their place.
One of the small fish dropped its breeding tube for a day or so and then it disappeared. I was hoping the larger ones would do that but I have no idea how old they are, or what age they start spawning.
[video=youtube_share;3oJCjMydX78]http://youtu.be/3oJCjMydX78[/video]
There isn't much to report at this point except that they're still very pushy and aggressive with each other. As you can see, the fins are a bit tattered. They actually healed over from the shipping but have now been damaged by their tankmates. I moved a bellycrawler pike into their tank tonight and they've been trying to give him hell, but he's quickly putting them in their place.
One of the small fish dropped its breeding tube for a day or so and then it disappeared. I was hoping the larger ones would do that but I have no idea how old they are, or what age they start spawning.
[video=youtube_share;3oJCjMydX78]http://youtu.be/3oJCjMydX78[/video]
They look great! Nice and fat already. Such a unique species.
Are they still in QT? May want to give them a rock so they have something to fight over, lol
Are they still in QT? May want to give them a rock so they have something to fight over, lol
I don't want to give them anything else to fight over! lol. That's all they do anyway. Even the group of four from Dan still fight all the time, and their tank is full of driftwood, flower pots, fake plants, and tankmates. Nothing deters them. Chasing, nipping, and darting all day...
No one knows much about them, you will be pretty much writing the book as far as these guys go. You might want to email Wayne Leibel, he did an article on them back in the 90's ... but it was one issue I'm missing so I never saw it.
I've exchanged a few emails with Wayne Leibel since the end of April -- he was supposed to receive the rest of the fish from Dan Ye that I didn't buy, and then he mentioned getting a second group from Jeff Rapps. I never heard back from him once I got my Heroina, so I don't know if he ever got his or not. I'm assuming that even if the fish from Dan Ye didn't pan out, he probably ended up with some from Jeff. Apparently they've been high on Wayne's wish list for a long time, too.
Which publication did his article appear in? I've never ran across it online. It might be worth trying to find an issue for sale online. I know that several people in Europe including Florent @ Cichlid Room Companion's forum have bred and raised them for years. They seem to be fairly easy to locate in Europe and even UK. I get the impression that they're not difficult to keep or breed.
His responses will be slow this time of year since he's a college professor. Around midterms and finals he gets a little slow, I generally send a email after finals to remind him. 
Aquarium Fish Magazine, he did a huge multipart series on all the SA cichlids starting in the early 90's and going through the mid to late 90's. I have most of them, but missed the one Heroina were in so I have no clue how extensive or short it might have been.
Aquarium Fish Magazine, he did a huge multipart series on all the SA cichlids starting in the early 90's and going through the mid to late 90's. I have most of them, but missed the one Heroina were in so I have no clue how extensive or short it might have been.
His responses will be slow this time of year since he's a college professor. Around midterms and finals he gets a little slow, I generally send a email after finals to remind him.
Hehe, yeah, that was my assumption. His last reply from a couple weeks ago said, "I will have to think on this awhile and get back to you." In the meantime I'll just learn by trial and error. There's really not much to them, though. Aside from the conspecific aggression, they are extremely easy. Maybe that's why they aren't very popular in the hobby. If they aren't real colorful and they don't present a challenge, people probably don't have much of an interest in them.
Another thing to note -- these fish are extremely messy. I feed them two or three times a day with NLS pellets, Hikari pellets, and/or frozen krill and bloodworms. The bottom of the quarantine tank is absolutely full of feces. It looks like I have a tankful of plecos. Then, to make matters worse, they forage through it all day looking for more food, so it breaks it all up and stirs it into the water column, leading to cloudy, smelly water. I do large w/c every day or two days. They're going to need some serious filtration when I set up their 150.
Also, you can find almost all of Dr. Leibel's "Goin' South" articles on this site: http://www.fishchannel.com
Just enter "goin south" into the search box and you'll find them. I've used them multiple times to try and ID various species of Mesonauta and Aequidens. Unfortunately, that site also seems to have missed the Heroina mention. I checked in the article about Heros and a few of the general cichlid articles, but no luck.
Just enter "goin south" into the search box and you'll find them. I've used them multiple times to try and ID various species of Mesonauta and Aequidens. Unfortunately, that site also seems to have missed the Heroina mention. I checked in the article about Heros and a few of the general cichlid articles, but no luck.
