Rescued a Pacu

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I already have, krichard. Rescued, I feed my other fish peas too so i already knew to peel the peas. :)

FINALLY! I think I may have hit a break! All those places I called had no clue who could help me except for the very nice lady at Virginia Zoological Park who sent out emails for me to other curators.

Here's what Craig from Virginia Zoological Park had to say -

Hi,

I received an e-mail while I was on vacation concerning a pacu you may be looking to place. I worked extensively with this species of fish at another facility,and while they are wonderful fish they get really huge! I maintained a school of them in a 55,000+ gallon tank to give you an idea of the space required. In looking for a potential location,the most ideal place(s) I can recommend are zoos and/or aquariums that currently house pacu. My old zoo in Milwaukee (Milwaukee County Zoo) houses them along with the following institutions: Shedd Aquarium (Chicago) and National Zoo (Washington,DC). I believe the Jacksonville Zoo has a large Amazon aquarium where they maintain them,and the Tennessee Aquarium in Chattanooga may also. The message I received stated that fish is ~8” long,which is still quite feasible to ship via FedExOvernight in a Styrofoam boxwith bagged water. Should you be able to find a home for this fish,but need some assistance in shipping the fish,please let me know and I can offer some assistance/guidance as my experience in maintaining fish also involved shipping them from one institution to another.

I hope this helps…feel free to contact me if you have further questions.
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I found NONE of this information on the internet. Once I get back home, I'm giving those places a call.

Cross your fins!
 
what a nice helpful considerate informative person... keeping my fingers crossed too.
 
Found out the Atlanta Aquarium also houses them, so I'll add that to my list of places to call.

Unbelievable. Found yet another Pacu... this time in Raleigh, NC. Where are these people buying these fish? Read the description... it's obvious they don't know what it actually is.

http://raleigh.craigslist.org/pet/2999813722.html

I have three tropical fish that need a new home. I am moving soon and they will not survive the trip. I have the following:

1 - Large Jack Dempsey Cichlid. It is about 8 inches long and about a year and a half old. It has beautiful colors and is very mild tempered.

1 - Large Firemouth Cichlid. It is about 5 inches long and the same age as the Dempsey. It is a little more aggressive but would do well in a community tank with other cichlids.

1 - Large Pacu. It is about 12 to 14 inches long and under a year old. Very mild tempered. It would do best in a larger aquarium or a pond. It looks like a piranha but hasn't sprouted its teeth yet. It has only eaten selected aquarium plants but will eat shrimp pellets and spinach.

All fish are disease free and in great health. If interested you will need a bucket or other means to get the fish home.
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ZeeZ said:
Unbelievable. Found yet another Pacu... this time in Raleigh, NC. Where are these people buying these fish?
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Several years ago, I printed out this picture and took it in to my little WalMart. I showed it to the manager of the fish section. After talking to him, he said they would no longer sell pacus.
Picture1.jpg


Unfortunately, my little WalMart is undergoing a major expansion over the next 1 1/2 years. Everytime I go in there, things have been moved around as they work around the building/construction. Earlier this month I stopped at a small fish/pet store that opened about a year ago. I was horrified to see a bunch of little pacu in a 2 gallon tank. The guy said they were selling a lot of pacus, and that their business had picked up substantially since WalMart won't be selling any fish for the next 1 1/2 years. I whipped out my smart phone and showed him pictures of my fish, tank, and this picture.
pacu20record20holder.jpg

He gave a bored, uninterested, "oh wow" and yawned as if I was distracting him from his boredom. I asked him about a cloudy 40 gallon tank--he knew nothing about it and said that the person who cleans the tank was taking care of it. People will do anything to make a $, including selling cute little pacu to uninformed wanna be fishkeepers.

You did a great thing rescuing that pacu. Unfortunately, the majority of pacu are doomed to short lives in miserable conditions unless they are among the lucky few who land in a big tank somewhere.
 
Good stuff man!!! Good intentions followed by good actions! My piranhas were rescued from a similiar situation same tank same muck but there were 5 4-5" rbp. Crazy how some people justify such practices of animal neglet!


Cheers to you!

#1 S. Vettel
 
ecoli73 said:
Simple petsmart sells them by the dozens


Sent from my iPhone using MonsterAquariaNetwork app
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I've never seen them at any of my local Petsmart, and I've been to quite a few.

pacu mom said:
Several years ago, I printed out this picture and took it in to my little WalMart. I showed it to the manager of the fish section. After talking to him, he said they would no longer sell pacus.
Picture1.jpg


Unfortunately, my little WalMart is undergoing a major expansion over the next 1 1/2 years. Everytime I go in there, things have been moved around as they work around the building/construction. Earlier this month I stopped at a small fish/pet store that opened about a year ago. I was horrified to see a bunch of little pacu in a 2 gallon tank. The guy said they were selling a lot of pacus, and that their business had picked up substantially since WalMart won't be selling any fish for the next 1 1/2 years. I whipped out my smart phone and showed him pictures of my fish, tank, and this picture.
pacu20record20holder.jpg

He gave a bored, uninterested, "oh wow" and yawned as if I was distracting him from his boredom. I asked him about a cloudy 40 gallon tank--he knew nothing about it and said that the person who cleans the tank was taking care of it. People will do anything to make a $, including selling cute little pacu to uninformed wanna be fishkeepers.

You did a great thing rescuing that pacu. Unfortunately, the majority of pacu are doomed to short lives in miserable conditions unless they are among the lucky few who land in a big tank somewhere.
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I thought Oscars and Bala Sharks were bad enough, but Pacus are three times as bad. At least Oscars are more manageable to house. Pacus aren't. They really should be put on a restricted list or something along those lines. I've seen both of those photos before, but when it's shown to someone who just doesn't care... Put him in the same situation, then he'd be singing a different tune. I've never seen Pacu offered for sale in my area at any of the LFS I've visited, yet these people are somehow finding them.

I also found another posting in Fuquay-Varina dated April 11, this time the same size as mine, 8 inch. This makes me wonder just how widespread this Pacu thing is... it seems the problem is much bigger than I had thought it was. Hopefully my rescue will be one of those lucky ones. I had actually been contemplating humane euthanasia if I couldn't find him anything after a month. That would be better than being doomed to a life in too-small tanks.
 
ecoli73 said:
This pacu thing is not new...almost as old as the Oscar thing...or the bala shark thing(of which I have five)


Sent from my iPhone using MonsterAquariaNetwork app
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I remember them being more popular when I was young and didn't know any better. But then I started seeing less and less of them so I figured that it had died out. At least in my area because I hadn't seen them for a good number of years.

Apparently not.
 
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