New snakehead set up

[Achilles1763]

Thanks dude, yeah that is what I am working for... less of a natural pair as an ‘arranged marriage’! I hope after a number of months they may accept each other as they get no other offers...but like closing time of Friday night at a **** singles bar lol. Any tips on anchoring the divider? I guess rocks at the base.. but what about the sides and top?

 

[Gaz_ham]

I've never used a divided. My brother once had one secured by rocks and one Oscar pushed the rocks/divider out of the way and killed the other.
After that, he always fixes it at the top of the tank and burries it in the substrate.
You could drop the water level and mastic some grooves in for the divider to slide in and out.

 

[Achilles1763]

Well got the divider in and he new make snakehead was doing great... but the female managed to undermine and get under the divider last night... and he got a bit of a kicking! So divider has been re-established and he is having time to heal up! The female is less than impressed by the divider in HER tank!

They had a good face biting fight earlier... any hope for this relationship? Lol!

 

[Gaz_ham]

It's not a good start. You can only give them time. I don't think it's likely, but only time will tell

 

[Achilles1763]

What would a good start look like? Or if she does accept him in is there any signs I should watch for?

 

[Ruolong]

Okay finally have the tank set up and picked up the snakehead this morning, I was talked into getting 2 channa pulchra to go in with the golden cobra... and they al seem happy with each other and have been basking in the branches in a group close to the surface. Not tried feeding yet, but I saw all of them eat in the shop, the cobra is doing well on smelt and the pulchra like bloody worms.

Sadly the cobra managed to give himself an ouchy on his bottom lip over the last night in the shop and seems a bit depressed... it hopefully he will bounce back in his new digs.

As you can see from the set up I have gone with underwater rainforest one side and rocks the other (these have been placed tactically to allow burrows/caves). I am quite pleased with it considering I had only a small budget to play with and this has all been done with scavenging older bits of decour I had hanging about.... all I had to buy was the plants.

So including the fish I managed to do the whole thing for £170! Not too bad I think.

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I would kill to have some of those !
Awesome fish !

 

[Achilles1763]

Yep I would to (if I couldn’t have them) there has been some shimmering between the two so I am still hopefully of a pair up. A very knowledgeable LFS dude said snakehead pairs are more to do with the environmental factor rather than the fish themselves... so I am varrying temp/food/plant cover to hopefully get a positive result.. below is the big female eyeballing me for food.. she is hyper aggressive and jumped out of the water and latched on to my fingers as I was sliding back the tank roof!

 

[TomatoandEgg]

keep us posted, i too am trying to get a p[air from my group. so far only ass kicking and territory wars

 

[Achilles1763]

Update, finally got a few plants to grow!! I clearly suck at growing aquatic plants but have finally got an amazon spear and a few water soldiers to grow.... divider is out but still not a pair yet. Hopefully the winter temp drop and rise in the spring will stimulate her breeding sense... but tank looks great if a bit green now due to surface coverage and she is a beast now 16 inches I would guess.

 

[piranhaman00]

Looks good! So divider is out and they are getting along somewhat?