Size of Goliath tiger fish

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big tank would be nice, but no matter how big your tank is, it cannot compare to the smallest creek or lake in terms of volume and surface area.

so usually people put them in a 240-300 or 500 or 900, which is nice, they grow fast and happy, or it seems, but when they swim full speed, which they can generate much more speed with the extra footprint, and result is usually death.

In Asia, you see a lot more big goliaths and vitattus than we do in the US., and most are kept and grown out in 48-72" long tanks. I've seen a 26" goliath in a 180 gallon square tank, and it was nearly perfect, and he was very calm. There is a couple more secrets to their success, but this is part one.

Of course if you have the means to keep them in a 50,000 pond or tank I'm sure they wouldn't complain. I'm speaking from personal experience, I've kept and imported tigers since 1998
 
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UnstoppableJayD said:
I went and dug this picture up for you guys...not my pic but gives you an idea... now my personal experience.. I had a 12 inch TAFT in a 500 gallon tank he got startled by my aro and slammed his head into the tank and died.... they need a lot of space.Good luck

View attachment 1070111
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this atf and tank were at the 'now closed' :ROFL:striker aquarium in singapore
 
GATF are fairly slow growers. You'll be lucky to see 10" out of a 2" juvenile out of the first year and 18" out of it by the second year.

The problem with these fish isn't how quickly they get big-- though their eventual size is DEFINITELY a concern. The pain problem one can encounter is the absolutely mind boggling turn of speed that these animals are capable of. A 6" ATF can go from one end of a 6' tank to the other in the blink of an eye. When dealing with a subadult specimen of 15" or so, your prize fish could easily kill itself smashing into the end of a tank that could easily house a cichlid of similar size.

In order to have one of these magnificent animals and be successful with it, you need to dedicate yourself to the husbandry of this animal. You'll need to specialze the tank to the needs of the fish. In order to do this, you'll need to replicate the crashing whitewater and violent current that they encounter in the wild. My general rule of thumb for these guys is 50x the volume of the tank: a 150 gallon tank should have no less than 7500 gph of current.

I'd go into more detail, but before I write a book, please review the sticky. If you have more questions after that, please feel free to hit me up!
 
I currently have a few tigers (not all are GATFs) and they are pretty docile. they don't dart across the tank and to my surprise, my biggest GATF has a good personality of it's own.

it knows when im about to drop food. i think i could blame this to my pack of tinfoil which also knew when i was about to feed em. i feed on a schedule and on a specific place. they schooled for a while then my tinfoils got bigger and eventually moved and was eaten by the big cats.

i always hear of them injuring themselves by darting across the tank. i paint all my walls black save for one viewing window. maybe it does something?
 
jlnguyen74 said:
This is the most accurate information so far in this thread...




Ironically, that vittatus went in a 300 gal, while a few years later, I grew a group of ATF range from 10"-14" in a much smaller tank without such incident. Care to guess the size of the tank?
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that's awesome bro

so is it because they tend to be less skittish when in a school? and maybe they know if they're in a smaller tank they have less room to blindly dart.

either way, that's good to know. if I should ever be able to again, i'm calling you for some gatfs
 
btw, there is a video floating around here of a giant tank in asia somewhere, they had the biggest gatf I've seen

it was a youtube video and even showed the gatf eating a big goldfish. I tried to look for it on youtube but couldn't find it
 
bobVillanueva said:
I currently have a few tigers (not all are GATFs) and they are pretty docile. they don't dart across the tank and to my surprise, my biggest GATF has a good personality of it's own.

it knows when im about to drop food. i think i could blame this to my pack of tinfoil which also knew when i was about to feed em. i feed on a schedule and on a specific place. they schooled for a while then my tinfoils got bigger and eventually moved and was eaten by the big cats.

i always hear of them injuring themselves by darting across the tank. i paint all my walls black save for one viewing window. maybe it does something?
Click to expand...

it depends. How big are the tigers? How big is the tank?
 
They are around 8-12 tanks 100,180 and 300

They gotta get used to the environment and the routine. The skittish ones in my observation are those who get transferred a lot or gets their tank rearranged often
 
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