I've got 2 grass pickerel in a 125 with northern longears,orange spotted sunfish,thread fin shad,mottled sculpin,rock bass,black crappie,large mouth bass ,smallmouth bass, white sucker,and a saugeye. Before everyone flames me. when the fish become to large they will be put in my pond. All fish are between 4 and 7 inches. Also have tall plants on one side for the pikes to hide.
pickerel
- Thread starter redrocker
- Start date
Mr.Catfish;4507572; said:
May want to move the bass when they start getting about the same size as the pickerel, keeping them together at a relatively close size is asking for disaster, they will eventually go after the pick if they think they can fit it in their mouth and considering the slim profile they will most likely succeed.
Yeah I know, the bass are about two inches shorter than the pike. I have had sucess in the past keeping them together until the bass are about 2 inches bigger than the pike.
Just wanted to make it clear that I wasn't flaming, just going by my past experience as I have owned almost everything on your list and the bass that I have kept have eaten some very "interesting" things that I really did not think they would go after. How big are your grass right now? From what I remember after about 8-9 inches the grasses start to plateau in their growth rate while the bass will quickly catch up to them.
No problem ,I didn't take it as you flaming me. At the moment the pikes are around 6 to 7 inches. The bass are around 5 inches. I keep everything well fed. None of the fish bother each other except for my rock bass. It seems not to like two of my crappie. It keeps them at one end of the tank. But the rock bass will be removed real soon as it is the biggest fish in the tank.It never used to chase anything until I thinned out the coon's tail about two weeks ago.
redrocker;4508899; said:
If you are going to do the bichir I would say keep the tank at the lower end of the heat spectrum (somewhere from 75-78 degrees) because while the Bichir prefers the warmer water the pickerel prefer a bit colder. I can't really speak for redfins as I never really had them but I did have grass and I can't think of a better tank mate than the bichir, considering how docile they usually are and they usually get to 16-20 inches which would keep it out of the mouth of the pickerel while the bichir isn't going to go for the pickerel.
As for caring for them they do NOT do pellets or dry food from my experience. Stay away from feeding them goldfish for the obvious reasons, when they are about 5-7 inches feed them rosy reds, after they get to about 8-10 inches I started to buy the cheap assorted african cichlids to mine, it just came out cheaper in the long run. Good luck and remember to post up pics if you get one
