Senegal bichir with 2 baby musks?
- Thread starter Deantrfc
- Start date
Share the same bottom quite frequently. Believe can be nippy so I’d say no.
The turtle will kill the fish if he can get ahold of it. We may be able to train reptiles to eat new things they normally wouldn't but you can't untrain thousands of years of evolution and instinct. Even if he can't fit the whole fish in his mouth that doesn't mean that he won't take bites out of it when he gets the chance. I wouldn't worry about the fish going for the turtle but I would worry about the turtle going for the fish. Also, not trying to be mean, most ppl think an aquatic turtle needs to stay in the water, this is wrong, even tho it is mostly aquatic it needs to have a lot of land to be able to bask and sunbathe on. Reptiles cannot maintain body temp on their own, they need to be able to leave the water for long periods of time in order to absorb heat from an outside source, usually either the sun in the wild or by a heat lamp in captivity. Hope this helps ya out.
Cheers mate. I know the requirements for musk turtles. I have a heatlamp for them but if you ask people who've had musks, they don't tend to bask. I have a basking area but it's very very rare they'll use them. It's just compatibility with fish because I've seen it work myself but then a lot of people will say it doesn't. Where I bought the musks from they where kept with fish and they said they're fine but then look online everywhere says it's a no go.
Yeah I do agree that there is allot of conflicting info out on the web these days. Personally I wouldn't add turtles with fish unless the fish were ment as a food source. It might be different if the bichir was full grown but that would only be me thinking the turtles would see it more as a threat rather then food. Also neat lil tid bit about bichirs is in the wild they are known to sometimes target prey larger then their own mouth (usually something already dead) and will deathroll it, like a crocodile, to rip it into smaller chunks to eat. Honestly it would be upto the turtles and their personalities on whether it would work out or not between them and the bichir. But if you do add them in with it I would make certain to make sure the bichir eats at night as the turtles may steal his food.
Here is my thoughts....
If the turtle were to be in with fast non-predatory fish that don't tend to sit in one place for long, it would probably be ok...ish. If you put the sen and turtles together you run the risk of the turtle chomping on the sen way more easily, frequently, because the sen is going to sit on the bottom. Issue 2 sens are a predator and may very well decide to go after the turtle. We don't think of sens as killers at least most of us in the poly world I think kind of put them on the low end of that scale when looking at polys. But they are predators. I know someone who had 5 senegals and used to feed them frogs all the time, big frogs, bull frogs and such alive. I don't condone that or like or watch it. But he had 5 of the biggest senegals I've ever seen. He wanted me to take them when he broke his tank down. I don't feed my polypterus live foods. I feed chopped tilapia, krill and pellets. I know there is always the possibility of one of them taking out one of the smaller ones or another fish in the tank. I try not to encourage the behavior by deliberately triggering their predatory instincts. I think the same goes for the turtle, any carnivore really. Yes I do believe that turtles and fish are not the best match but it can be done. It helps if the turtle knows that food it likes to eat will be much easier and more available then chasing fish around. It also helps if the fish don't really want to interact (either good or bad) with the turtle.
If the turtle were to be in with fast non-predatory fish that don't tend to sit in one place for long, it would probably be ok...ish. If you put the sen and turtles together you run the risk of the turtle chomping on the sen way more easily, frequently, because the sen is going to sit on the bottom. Issue 2 sens are a predator and may very well decide to go after the turtle. We don't think of sens as killers at least most of us in the poly world I think kind of put them on the low end of that scale when looking at polys. But they are predators. I know someone who had 5 senegals and used to feed them frogs all the time, big frogs, bull frogs and such alive. I don't condone that or like or watch it. But he had 5 of the biggest senegals I've ever seen. He wanted me to take them when he broke his tank down. I don't feed my polypterus live foods. I feed chopped tilapia, krill and pellets. I know there is always the possibility of one of them taking out one of the smaller ones or another fish in the tank. I try not to encourage the behavior by deliberately triggering their predatory instincts. I think the same goes for the turtle, any carnivore really. Yes I do believe that turtles and fish are not the best match but it can be done. It helps if the turtle knows that food it likes to eat will be much easier and more available then chasing fish around. It also helps if the fish don't really want to interact (either good or bad) with the turtle.
Yeah that's the thing I have here with my fish, he definitely couldn't swallow them whole but he could definitely kill a few of them so I can't keep him in there but how slow my musks eat and move I don't think they'd be able to catch a fish but my bicher is so stupid so I don't know that's why I'm here but if he can't go in my musk tank it means getting rid of him