Blue-eyed breeding...?

[mikeyrose]

Well, here's probably a dumb question. It recently came to my attention that the blue-eyed pleco (Panaque suttoni or suttonorum) has for some years now been an extremely rare, expensive species, at one point thought to be extinct in the wild. Reading two old threads about them here seems to confirm that they're indeed very rarely seen...what comes up seems to be mostly the similar P. cochliodon, which looks more bluish-grey. At first even finding a photo of a black one for a "Hope your birthday sucks" pleco card was a bit tough.
Being that I'm a pleco-lover specifically (fish and catfish lover in general), and they're one of the prettiest species, I found that terribly sad. And then I thought, "Well, would it maybe be possible to start a breeding program...?" I figured if it were that simple, someone would already be doing it. (Maybe by now someone is?) But then, it'd probably be tricky to even obtain a breeding pair and hope that it worked successfully, soooo...I dunno. Was just thinkin', and wondering whether it'd even be a real possibility. 8-\

Also, I would love to know the official pronunciations of species/genus names. I mean, I never hear them spoken, so... I'm guessing that Panaque, for instance, is "Pan-ack?"

[Shane]

Welcome. The word, which is both the common name in Venezuela and the genus name, is pronounced pah-nah-kay. Breeding in captivity of large Panaque species is very, very rare as males are quite territorial even toward females. One would need a large tank and a compatible pair. Having a male kill a couple of females before he finds one he likes would get expensive fast.
-Shane

[matthewfaulkner]

As far as I know, neither of the 'blue eye' species have been bred, but recently a

Panaque cf_armbrusteri`araguaia`

spawn was documented in the magazine Amazonas.

A public aquarium in the UK (Bolton) used to have a group (of P. cochliodon I think) and I know of a couple of individuals who had pairs/groups.

[2wheelsx2]

There is someone already trying to do it in Indonesia, as well as already mass producing H. zebra.

http://www.bellenz.com/about.php

[mikeyrose]

Cool, thanks for the replies.

I see...boy, they're choosy about their women, eh? But that's all interesting. Glad to see the Indonesian breeding place having some success with them, and other beauties such as the Zebra. Hopefully through such efforts they'll never become extinct for real.

Ah, the pronunciation--finally! I was thinking more of a French-ish one, I guess, but being that they're South American in origin, that makes sense.

[lmt6600]

here is the link of the Araguaia that Matt was talking about, atleast a video of the eggs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HK_fP4d0KXM

[mikeyrose]

Awesome! What a cute little bright yellow cluster.
Man, that guy has so many gorgeous fishies in his videos; could I be more jealous? Buuuuut, since I hope to be able to move within the next couple years, this probably isn't the right time or place to start having my dream aquaria set up...

P.S. Don't know why I didn't think of this months ago, but in case anyone was at all unclear on the exact fishes I/we were talking about, here they are!: