Phractura ansorgii (African Whiptails)

[benke]

Just bought me eight of this for me, up until now, unknown catfish. It seems as its never been sold in Sweden before so I can get very little information through Swedish forums. Therefore I ask all of you if you have anything to say when it come to feeding and breeding. The little info I've got so far is to be found at http://www.scotcat.com/factsheets/phractura_ansorgii.htm but if someone who actually got this fish in their own tank, can give me some of their experience that'll be cool.

cheers
B

[MatsP]

Hej Benke, Välkommen till Planet Catfish.

Since others will probably be interested in my answer (although it's probably not MUCH help), I'll continue in English.

I think you made a great find in getting these fish, and I do hope you have success in keeping (and perhaps also breeding) them.

There is quite a bit of detail on Phractura clauseni, about breeding and keeping them in several books, including Lothar Seegers "The Catfishes of Africa". It also says that they are found in overlapping distribution, so care is probably similar.

Our page is here:

Phractura ansorgii

As I said above, it's not much help, as this is not a commonly available fish.

--
Mats

[benke]

Tack tack Mats!
As you said, others may find this interesting so we keep it in English.

All eight of them seem to have calmed down and adapted quite well considering the treatment they got yesterday (catching, releasing, catching, releasing).
The test samples of the water seems to be close to perfect.

Here's a picture from yesterday. According to what I've read, the male should be looking quite close to what the right one does. But it has now chanced its colour to something more brown-ish.
Three of the are a bit larger than the other five. And from what I can tell it seems as the larger ones are closer to brown rather than grey (as the small ones).

Dose anyone have any idea of when I may be possible to tell the different between males and females? Non of them are looking as pale as a male should. But as I said, there's some different in there colour.

[Richard B]

This is indeed a great find

Essentially you need a fine sand substrate, cooler water, plenty of oxygenation, and feed small live food/frozen live foods.

[benke]

Yesterday I gave them some cyclops. And they ate like they haven't been eating for days. Which may be the case. All eight of them are still alive. They seem to breathe quite fast. But not as heavily as they did day one.

Think I'm gonna ad some beach sand to the already quite fine substrate. Will also ad a bunch of vallisneria.
Pictures are still to come!

[Birger]

Nice find!

I would concentrate on stabilizing them in their tank and making sure they are eating well before worrying about sexing...some of these overlap in their ranges and may be a mix of species even.

Please continue to keep us posted.
Birger

[senil]

That was a real good buy and I am sure that you’ve got yourselves some fish friends there especially since the Phractura ansogii are a very friendly breed and are well adjusting!! Are the two in the picture the bigger ones you mentioned!! The book mentioned here is the best you can lay your hands on – good luck!!

[sidguppy]

if you got them to eat.....then you're halfway

these are fragile like they're from glass, but often they don't eat and starve

so if they feed well, you're on the right track.

got rainwater for waterchanges? as far as I know they live in really soft water....and need a LOT of oxygen

[jippo]

Are these still alive? I think they are from same shipment that I got mine last winter. Mine are dead, I hope yours are doing better.

[benke]

Sorry for not having update for a long time!

This is what have happened.

Of the original 8 individuals only 2 survived. The other 6 started to die one by one(during a week or so) after maybe a month. The two surviving grew quickly large and they seems to have been adapted well. Even though we, during some periods, haven't been to good at proceeding water changes and so on.
A month ago we did get yet another chance to buy some new individuals. And since we've managed to keep 2 alive for almost 6 month, we felt confident enough and bought 5 new. So now we've got a total amount of 7.

We've made some reflections that I'd like to share.

It took us a while to figure out the best way to feed them. What seems to work the best is to give them a big quantity of grindal worm while the power head is shut off for some minutes to make sure that they can feed them self with the worms. They do seem to have bad sight since they just search the bottom randomly, and even though there's a pile of worms next to them, they might well just keep searching in another direction. So If I shut the power head for five minutes, they got the time to scan the bottom for worms.

Live grindal worms and frozen blood worms have been the most successful food to give them. (mostly grindal since we've got a good, growing culture). They seem to refuse all kinds of dried food.

They seems to be very fixed to just one specific place in the tank. Most likely it's due to the currency. But since it's a triangular tank and the pump is blowing the water towards the front-glass in a 90 degrees angle, they currency should be about the same all around the tank.
My friend's (who also bought some) samples tend to only be located at the inlet to the pump, rather than at a root located in front of the pump.

I've started to think of maybe build a custom-made tank that would be rather wide, but not so deep or high. And fit it with a quite strong power head in one end and fill it with small roots and stones too make it as a small creek. But would only contain maybe some 30 liters or so. So maybe it would be to small to secure a good water quality. What do you think?

I'm very unsure about the sexes . Maybe they're all the same. Most of them have a very dark pattern on a bright background. Some of them though are very all dark, more of a black pattern on a dark brown background. And the two are about the same size. No other differences have been noticed. So I can't for sure separate the sexes.

Will try to take some photos of them for you, though it's very dark in the tank.

[RickE]

But would only contain maybe some 30 liters or so. So maybe it would be to small to secure a good water quality. What do you think?

How about adding a nice big sump to give you a more stable water volume?

Good luck with the newbies. They sound like a fascinating challenge.

[Shane]

Great information. These are known to be very hard to keep alive in an aquarium.
-Shane

[rommer]

Very good to hear there are some still alive! Good work!

I wouldn't go for a 30 liter tank. I don't know if they are territorial, but i guess the are (at least a little bit), so space could be a problem and you have to keep the water really clean for them.

I don't know if you have some fish in the tank otherwise i might be a good idea to put in some shrimps like Neocaridina heteropoda. They will keep the tank clean and so keep your water quality better (and provide some live food!).