Real Mini Monsters

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DiXoN

DiXoN

English MFKer
MFK Member
Sep 5, 2004
10,977
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Sunderland, England
i was looking to set up another tank when my house remodelling is complete and want to set up a planted tank with mopani wood and was going to add some dwarf channa but have decided to go for pike topminnows and want some Belonesox belizanus instead.
now i have never kept anything like this fish but after seeing a video of the a year or so back have always been intriged about these mini monsters.
has anyone kept these and if so the info i want is breeding conditioning and can you get them onto prepared foods and what is a god tankmate.
the tank i want is something like a 36x20x20 or a 40x20x20 (i will get it made) and as advised above want some plants so would need to know what plant is good for them too.
also are they jumpers as i wanted to only have glass covers and hanging lights.
dixon
 
I have kept them and got them onto floating small pellets, occasional guppies, glass shrimp, and crickets. I used the method of using a few peelets when feeding with crickets and increasing the ratio of pellets over time. After a while they would take either, no problem. I did notice that after a while without live food they stopped breeding and the females would sometimes eat a male.
The plants I used were elodea, java moss, and corkscrew val.
I mainly kept them alone but for a while I kept several in an old metal frame tank around 35g (30x18x15"), they were with a pair of callichthys cats and a banded gourami.
I tended to fish out the young ones (if I was quick enough) and give them away.
I liked them but I have always liked fish of that body shape and they are really amazing to feed.
 
well i got me a tank today as it was a bargain its not as big as i wanted and still may get a bigger one later but it came with all the equiptment.
the tank is 32x15x16 so an odd size.
how many do you think i could keep in this set up
 
That is a nice size (33g) and shape for them, use a lot of plants seprated by open paths and you can keep 6-9 easily. That was how I stocked my 35g. Try twice as many males as females. If yours are like mine were you can expect the females to produce youngevery 1 1/2 -2 months at 76-78 degrees F. and produce at least 50-100 at a spawning (one was recorded by the Florida Museum of Natural History as producing 322 at one spawning), the young are around 1/2" long, skinny, mottled, and hard to see. The adults eat them. At one point I had so many 1/2 grown ones in an outdoor tub I was using them as feeders. They do best if you add a little salt (1 tbs/5g will work). They only live a few years so save some young.
 
guppy said:
That is a nice size (33g) and shape for them, use a lot of plants seprated by open paths and you can keep 6-9 easily. That was how I stocked my 35g. Try twice as many males as females. If yours are like mine were you can expect the females to produce youngevery 1 1/2 -2 months at 76-78 degrees F. and produce at least 50-100 at a spawning (one was recorded by the Florida Museum of Natural History as producing 322 at one spawning), the young are around 1/2" long, skinny, mottled, and hard to see. The adults eat them. At one point I had so many 1/2 grown ones in an outdoor tub I was using them as feeders. They do best if you add a little salt (1 tbs/5g will work). They only live a few years so save some young.
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well i was lucky to get this whole set up cheap as someone came up to me a work and asked if i wanted it and only £20 ($33).
and now after asking around i find out a livebearer experts who has kept or is even keeping these lives in my town.
these fish are realy hard to get over here so i may have struck lucky twice in one day.
i will keep you all posted
 
Lol great video Dixon good luck with the set up. I didn't use salt when I had them but I think it depends on the locality as to whether they do need it, although I didn't know that at the time. If I can add one suggestion it would be to add loads of riccia or some other floating plant at the surface then you will see their natural behaviour. And yes, the females will definitely eat their males if they are hungry as I found out when I went away for a weekend! This was about 10 years ago when I was living in Lancashire. I got them from BAS and I haven't seen one since.....
 
They can adapt to a very wide range of salinity, from slightly soft to (in one Florida population) full salt. They tend to get fungus without a little salt. They are very hardy and can live in foul water.
 
i can use a little salt thats no problem.
the person who is a livebearer expert near me does not keep these now but i will still get some somehow
 
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