How aggressive are ornate bichir's?

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Yumu

Yumu

Candiru
MFK Member
Dec 7, 2009
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Ny
I have a seven inch ornate bichir. I'm getting a few 3inch gulper cats. I've had gulpers before and they don't bother anything that they can't swallow(which is not much) Will the ornate try and consume and or harass the gulpers? I know I may have to watch out for the gulpers eating the ornate eventually but not the other way around I hope. Any info is greatly appreciated.


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no. ornates although one of the more territorial bichirs won't harass or pursue other bottom dwellers if they are given enough room to have seperate territories.

my little 4" ornate bichir (I got him at 2") got on really well with my senegal and delhezi. but once the ornate got to around 4" he became super territorial and wouldn't let anyone near his cave. I would catch him beating up the other bichirs. I had a 7" ornate in my 225 and once I put the 4" one in with him they had a little chase and that was that.

because I have a 5' x 3' footprint there are multiple territories and because each ornate has its own "cave" when they do meet eachother out looking for food they totally ignore eachother. In fact on multiple ocasions I have caught the 2 ornates snuggled up together with the knifefish in a cave.

my ornates are now around 7"-9" each. They are one of the more aggressive readily available bichirs but if you keep them either with no decorations (if there is no territory they can't fight over it) or keep them in a bigger tank with lots of hiding places.

lemme just add, I keep 4 bichirs or varying sizes, I have a pleco in there and a clown knife. the smallest fish is a 3" datnoid. the Bichirs have never given me trouble with any tankmates. they tend to totally ignore the fish around them.
 
depends on the bichir... ive had really mellow ones and really aggressive ones... i had a sen that ate any fish it could catch, and an endli that would only eat pellets.. my ornate also ate smaller fish given the opportunity, and wasnt territorial at all with non-bichir tankmates.

Personally i wouldnt chance it, unless i knew my ornate was mellow.
 
I think ornates are pretty mellow. Endi are pretty nasty when big. Mine endi is mellow but aggressive towards my other polys when feeding. My large senegal is really aggressive

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my ornates pretty mellow
 
Depends on what "aggressive" means.
My 8" ornate doesn't bother any other bichirs. In fact, my 2 ornates snuggle up a lot.

However, the 8" ornate has eaten 3" clown loach, 3" congo tetra, and miscellaneous tetras.
I don't call that aggression. That's just eating yummy food.
 
Ornates aren't aggressive but they are ravenous and will eat fairly large fish. I had a couple of fat foot long ones that were eating 6 inch long africans that I thought they couldn't consume. They ate several overnight. Oops. :\
 
Trying to upload pictures of my new gulper babies but this new iPhone upgrade is not allowing me to. In fact, having a lot of trouble with this website...


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