CENTRAL AMERICAN catfish... are there any?

piranha45 · Post by **piranha45** » 16 Jan 2005, 11:24

recently, a thread was brought up on a different forum regarding speculation about what would predate upon dovii, a large central american cichlid specie that gets 2-3 feet in length. The only large catfishes capable of taking such a fish down that I could think of all reside in SA. Are there any large CA catfish species?

CI CHLID IS CENSORED OUT? LOL

sidguppy · Post by **sidguppy** » 16 Jan 2005, 11:35

That should be Pylodictis olivaris
or a similar fish.

piranha45 · Post by **piranha45** » 16 Jan 2005, 11:37

I imagine this fish doesn't get anywhere near big enough to eat a 2 foot dovii either, eh?

sidguppy · Post by **sidguppy** » 16 Jan 2005, 11:38

It reaches 5 foot/a meter and half....

a two or three feet fish would be fair game!

piranha45 · Post by **piranha45** » 16 Jan 2005, 11:53

whoa! ill be damned. The fact-sheet for the link you gave me has virtually nothing on it, so i thought otherwise.

however, the fish's habitat is in mexico, which is too far north of the dovii's range... and i doubt that fish lives in lakes and rivers..

but nonetheless you answered my question

do you know of any other large CA catfish species, or if this is the only one?

sidguppy · Post by **sidguppy** » 16 Jan 2005, 13:08

afaik this fish also occurs much farther south; well into countries south of Mexico.

but there are plenty of other predators that tackle dovii and the like; none are even remotely suitable for any tank.

one of the biggest is of course the Alligator-Gar; Lepisosteus spp.
there's a species in Central America that can reach 7 feet otr more.

another big one would be the Bullshark (Carcharhinus leucas) wich has a freshwatervariety in Lake Nigaragua, and it's the biggest toppredator in there, feeding on cichlids.

Walter · Post by **Walter** » 16 Jan 2005, 15:06

Hi,
many species of Loricariids also are from Central America.
Species of genus Ancistrus, Hypostomus, Loricaria, ...

Mary E. Power has worked with Centralamerican Loricariids and wrote some papers and a chapter of a Catfish book about the ecology of these fish.
The best: You can read her work for free, her papers are available as pdf on her website:

http://ib.berkeley.edu/labs/power/publications.php

piranha45 · Post by **piranha45** » 16 Jan 2005, 15:48

gator gars, according to fishbase.org, do not live any farther south than veracruz, mexico. dovii on the other hand, are no farther north than honduras, so I think its reasonable to say these two species don't cohabitate in the wild.

the bullshark is a good thought!

good to know there's CA plecos too

here's the current compiled listing of dovii predators, then:
1) men
2) caimans
3) bullsharks

Post by **Silurus** » 16 Jan 2005, 15:55

gator gars, according to fishbase.org, do not live any farther south than veracruz, mexico

They don't, but there is the tropical gar (Atractosteus tropicus), which is found in southern Mexico south to Nicaragua. Tropical gars reach about five feet in length.

sidguppy · Post by **sidguppy** » 16 Jan 2005, 17:29

And in the past all these Gars were labelled as Lepisosteus; hence my mix-up....

I KNEW there was one species of those that was in fact a tropical fish; just didn't know it had gotten a new speciesname, though....

how about big Ictalurids, HH?
not that far south?

Post by **Silurus** » 16 Jan 2005, 17:52

Ictalurids get replaced by Rhamdia south of Mexico.