Mesonauta Egregius

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Aquanero

Aquanero

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I ordered 4 F0 Mesonauta Egregius yesterday from TUIC, thought I'd take advantage of the 20% off sale. Turns out Jeff had 5 of the smaller 2-2.5" left so he's sending me all 5. I haven't kept Festivum in years. I always wanted to but never had a tank I thought would be right for them, do to either the species I was keeping or the set-up. I was not familier with this particular species but after doing some reasearch I found they have a very interesting pattern and stay relativly small around 4". They will arrive this afternoon. Once I have them in the tank I'll post some pics. They will be going into my 55 planted tank with my F0 Rams, Laetacara dorsigera and a small school of 10 Glo-lite Tetras to round out what I hope will be a nice SA display. If anyone has any experiance with this species I'm all ears.
 
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Haven't kept these guys but have kept insignis, guyanae and of course festivus. There was one other one that I kept back in the day. Anyway, I'd assume that they'll act pretty much like "festivums" :)

I have a pair of insignis in my 180 - with a bunch of much larger fish - that breed on a tall piece of driftwood every couple of weeks. The female lays her body over the eggs when she sleeps at night. They can be pretty aggressive when they breed, but the Rams and Laetecara will stay near the bottom. I wouldn't be shocked to see a tetra or three disappear over the years, either.

As an aside, I'm not sure how necessary it is for the dorsigera to have a cool down period, but they're a more neo-tropical than the rams, especially (who like it hot).

Sounds nice,
Matt
 
Yes, I've owned some pretty nasty festivum in the past also. My thinking was as you suggest, the dorsigera and the rams stay close to the bottom while the festium will stay up in and among the Val. That is my vision for filling the water colum. As far as the tetras che sera sera.

It is interesting the dorsiegra might need a cool down period, I never heard that before. I will do a little reasearch and see what I can find out. In the mean time if anyone reads this and has some insight, please let me known.

Thanks for the reply Matt.
 
Most Dorsigera are from Argentina...although I think that their distro is pretty wide. Not sure that they need a cool down period as much as high temps (mid-80s) might be un-natural for them.

I've always kept them at room temp (which in my basement fishroom is about 70-72 in the summer and ~70 in the winter...lower in lower tanks). As an aside, I also keep most of my CAs at similar temps.

Matt
 
They are widly distributed, my understanding was they are found in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil and Paraguay. I would imagin the water can get pretty warm in the northern part of their range. However I have no idea where my fish come from. They could be the Hobokin strain for all I know.....lol. I will say I see no sign of any ill effects from being kept at 85, having said that I'm not sure if will have an effect on longivity.
 
I have four dorsigera that are going on 3 years old. They were wild-caught and I got them from Rapps back in 2008. They quit breeding about a year ago but they're still kicking. I've always kept them around 82F.

Every species of Mesonauta I've kept has been aggressive. They've all been wild-caught. I also keep them in groups of six, while a lot of the people here who claim to have peaceful festivums usually keep them as single fish or in smaller groups. I don't know if any of that has any bearing on their aggression. Either way, I've gotten rid of all mine because they were dive-bombing my severums and chocolate cichlids, and just generally making all my other SAs jumpy and nervous. The only fish they didn't seem to attack was my psittacus. The males ended up being big and bulky, 7"+.

Supposedly I had M. acora and M. festivus, but every time I posted pictures I was told a different species by multiple people. So who knows what they were.
 
I agree alot of them don't seem to be very festive, maybe they were named sracasticly. I'm hoping that since these are one of the smallest sp. of Mesonauta they might be a little mellower as discribed in a few profiles I've read. They will go into a fairly heavly planted tank, with some very long Val and Cabomba a carpet covering of Crypts and floating Frog Bit. Well we shall see.
 
The Festivum arrived yesterday around 5PM. All were very healthy looking and active. I offered them a little food once I had them settled into the quarenteen tank and they gobbled up the NLS Thera +A 1mm pellets I feed them, always a good sign. I also saw them poop and all is looking well so far. I left the light off in the tank to reduce stress and when I checked on them this morning everyone was present and accounted for.
 
Not sure if you are still around but if so can you provide an update on your experience with these fishes. If they were more passive or aggressive over time and so forth ?
 
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