Vulture catfish info?
- Thread starter Quo Vadis
- Start date
I also have 35 of tbem in my pond and they never bother anything. Where did these reports of being so aggressive come from?
35? Wow, that's the biggest captive school I've hear of. Neat!
The reports of their vicious feeding habits come from observing them in the wild both feeding without human interference and feeding on a hooked fish. They latch on and tear off large strips of tissue. It says all they need is a small abrasion and a piece of skin hanging to strip a huge portion out of a victim.
They have special dentition among catfish and also high agility and flexibility to accomplish that.
That's the origin of their other nickname - machete catfish.
They also latch onto a hooked fish and don't let go allowing to be pulled out of the water together with the hooked fish.
They are also observed to hang around dumps and feed on urban waste, earning the better-known name vulture catfish.
I have had one about 9 inch for a few months now and he sits in the back corner and never moves. Will only eat in the pitch black . In really not enjoying him unfortunately. The one I have though seems to not be the regular behavior according to the rest of you guys.
J jaws7777 story was very similar and then the fish turned around for him completely. I hope he will chime in here to help you out Mike and/or you can read about his vulture kitty here: https://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/threads/vulture-catfish.697185/
Thanks, this is what in hoping for. There is nothing really else I can do as he is in a nice size tank of 6ftx4.5ft footprint and only other fish are half a dozen chocalte cichlids, a 8 inch Clown Knife some pim cats , and a 4 inch Giraffe cat.
Wow, great size tank for the lil' buzzard. I wonder what else you could do other than play with lighting and landscape, assuming your water is pristine. IIRC, Jaws switched tanks or maybe it was just the size / age thing.
My 6-pack has never done what you describe but they are very far from constant cruisers too.
Travis can help too, I think, as well as other vulture keepers from Jaws' thread.
My 6-pack has never done what you describe but they are very far from constant cruisers too.
Travis can help too, I think, as well as other vulture keepers from Jaws' thread.
This is our pool with 35 of these so called killers mix with 40 red hook silver DOLLARS, and 8 other species of fish. Never have touched snother fish. Also have them in 4 other tanks with 30 different species of fish with not one issue. They are great tank cats. Planet catfish is where this vicious post was made about them in nature in areas where it is severely overfished. If I was built to survive that's what I would do also if no food was present. They are very aggressive eaters but only towards the food not tankmates. If anyone else out there has observed them for as long as me in a feeding pack they would realize the deffinatly have a bad re
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