My tank and inhabitants

[Martin S]

As promised in the auchenipterids thread, a couple of shots taken today.
My Tank (Juwel Rekord 70)

Emperor Tetra (Male - only 1 in school of 8!)

And finally, the male

Centromochlus perugiae

Will try and do some more and improve my photo taking skills at the same time!
Martin

[andywoolloo]

Cool! I really like ur tank and fish, very nice! I have never heard of a Tatia Perugia and way cool ur lone male in the tetra schoal! Lucky lucky lucky.

[Richard B]

Nice...effortless minimalism, creating a great aquascape!

[Martin S]

Cool! I really like ur tank and fish, very nice! I have never heard of a Tatia Perugia and way cool ur lone male in the tetra schoal! Lucky lucky lucky.

Yes, I found a shoal of 8 in my local pets at home which were a good size, and although the shop assistant said there were two males, I knew there was only one. He has really coloured up and has started being quite territorial around the plants in back left - so much so that I keep seeing him dive into them. The

Centromochlus perugiae

seem to have settled in now, one of the females spends her days face up in the far right bunch of vallis, whereas the male and other female are often so well hidden I cannot find them, but think they are under or right behind the bogwood.
Thanks for the comments so far - I wanted to put background on the tank, but think that actually it doesn't need it and the wall colour behind doesn't spoil it.
I am keen to get some more photos together, especially if I can catch the

Chaetostoma sp(1)

out of his home and also the three

Corydoras Reynoldsi

.
Thanks again
Martin

[Marc van Arc]

I wanted to put background on the tank

Do so. It'll make the tank so much nicer, honestly.

[Martin S]

Same tank, background added and lots of plant growth (believe it or not, this is the same plants from the earlier picture!)

Martin

[andywoolloo]

WOW!!

Amazing!!

How many months from top pic to the now pic?

[Marc van Arc]

Same tank, background added and lots of plant growth (believe it or not, this is the same plants from the earlier picture!)

I have no reason to doubt your statement. Huge improvement. Well done.

[Richard B]

Are the tatia still hiding out in the same places - presuming you can see them?

[Martin S]

WOW!!

Amazing!!

How many months from top pic to the now pic?

4 weeks exactly!

I have no reason to doubt your statement. Huge improvement. Well done.

Many thanks.

Are the tatia still hiding out in the same places - presuming you can see them?

Pretty much - two of them just rest inside the 'cabomba' type plant and the third has found a hollow under the bogwood, and I have never seen her out. I have now added a timer for the lights, which means that they get a good hour in darkness before 'night feeding', which seem to ensure the non-nocturnal (diurnal?) fish have settled in for the night. The male tatia is always cruising the tank in darkness and goes mad when the bloodworm go in.
I'm trying to figure out how to get some pictures using my wife's Nikon D40x - the tank shots are relatively easy but am struggling with close-ups, even in the camera's macro mode. Will keep trying as want to post a picture of my new L340 to check it is actually that!
Thanks again for all the kind words.
Martin

[Martin S]

A couple of shots of two of my cats - the ones I really wanted to catch wouldn't come out to play

Chaetostoma milesi

Corydoras reynoldsi

Will have to keep practising I think!
Martin

[Martin S]

Managed to catch the milesi feeding...

[Martin S]

A couple more fish...

Corydoras metae

Pseudolithoxus dumus

Apistogramma panduro (male)

Martin

[MrJim]

Nice photography job!

[Martin S]

Nice photography job!

Thanks!
Actually, the picture of the Apistrogramma was taken by my 8 year old daughter who found it very funny she'd managed to get a shot of a fish who was in the middle of doing a number 2
Martin

[nikelodeon79]

LMAO!! Your daughter sounds cute.

Beautiful tank and fish! I love the sand!

[Martin S]

LMAO!! Your daughter sounds cute.

Hmmmmm...sometimes...but not always
I think "8 going on 18" about sums her up!

Beautiful tank and fish! I love the sand!

Thanks
Yes, I like the sand too - it came from my LFS. In hindsight, it's a bit on the deep side, but even with a standard T8 tube, I'm having amazing plant growth, especially with the vallis which i'm having to cut back once every 4-5 weeks. The anubias nana and a.barteri are both growing very well too, so am obviously doing something right. It's very different now, as have pulled any plants that didn't do well long term, (all the tall ones with the exception of the vallis in the last tank photo) and the java moss has been moved onto the bogwood (it just got too overgrown for the cave), but am about to move it all over to my new tank, so hopefully it will spread out better and give the fish a bit more room.
Thanks again for the kind words
Martin

[Martin S]

Finally got round to taking an update since the new tank has been installed in the place of the old one. As already mentioned, the size is 30" x 18" x 18", lit by a single T5 tube and filtered with a larger Eheim 2226 external. The plants appear to be starting to grow again since the move a couple of weeks back. The breeder box you see in the right corner is temporary until I get a smaller tank set up to move the endler to, and to house my smaller tatias as the newest inhabitant (

Tetranematichthys wallacei

) has a large mouth!

Martin

[MatsP]

Your C. metae doesn't look like my C. metae, and I think yours are C. melini.

--
Mats

[Martin S]

Mats
Looking at the cat-elog images, mine look identical to those of

Corydoras metae

- the images of

Corydoras melini

show a fish with similar face mask and fin colours, but the body colour is much paler and has some patterning.
C.melini (from Cat-eLog)

C.metae (from Cat-eLog)

I am no expert, and know how much more knowledge and experience you have, but just from the Cat-eLog images, I'd say C.metae for my fish was right.
Martin

[MatsP]

Look at the caudal fin and the black stripe. In C. metae, the black stripe ends where the caudal fin starts. With C. melini, the stripe continues into the caudal fine.

--
Mats

[Martin S]

So it does!
OK, fair point, although the colour was my main indicator as metae is exactly the same colour as mine, but melini is more mottled and not so orange. I think I'll ask the question in the What is my Catfish and see what the consensus is.
Thanks
Martin

[Carp37]

I agree with Mats- as well as the black stripe, your fish also appear to show the weaker lines (which I'm guessing will fade in and out a bit depending on the fishes' mood or light conditions, if my CW021 are anything to go by) that mellini has but metae appears to lack.

[Martin S]

A couple of shots of the small auchenipterids, namely:

Tatia sp(2)

Centromochlus perugiae

(Male)

Martin

[nvcichlids]

Beautiful tanks and fish, I envious of your perugiae/ any wood cats you have lol. I have been looking now for a while, thought I found someone who bred them and they lied, they had never heard of them.(figures)
I hope to get some soon, hopefully will hear confirmation from an importer later today or tomorrow.

Keep the pictures coming, love seeing those fish!

NV

[Martin S]

Beautiful tanks and fish, I envious of your perugiae/ any wood cats you have lol. I have been looking now for a while, thought I found someone who bred them and they lied, they had never heard of them.(figures)
I hope to get some soon, hopefully will hear confirmation from an importer later today or tomorrow.

Keep the pictures coming, love seeing those fish!

NV

Thankyou. Yes, am a real 'woodcat' fan and was so pleased when I finally got my C.perugiae. I am lucky to have an excellent LFS who knows that I like the unusual!
Thanks again
Martin