Pimelodus ornatus - do they eat other cats?

snowball · Post by **snowball** » 30 Nov 2005, 01:06

I'm curious about the predatory habits of P. ornatus with regards to whether they are fond of eating other catfish species, in particular Callichthyidae. Are they a regular part of their diet, or do these Pims know to avoid such spiny fish?

I have seen some mid-sized (approx 6" to 8") ornatus in a LFS that are housed with adult Brochis splendens with no reports of eating them and the Brochis do not appear distressed by the presence of the P. ornatus. Is this apparantly peaceful coexistance likely to continue, or will the ornatus eat the Brochis as soon as they think they can fit them down their gullet? What about Corydoras such as adult C. robineae, or even smaller species?

Further to this, would a school of feeder fish such as Black Widow tetras (Gymnocorymbus ternetzi) serve an alternative food source, or would the pims simply move on to the corys as soon as the small tetras are depleted?

Other fish that would be kept with the P. ornatus are H. inspector, Farlowella sp., Chalceus erythrurus, Satanoperca jurupari & probably some common bristlenose for algae control.

buzz763 · Post by **buzz763** » 30 Nov 2005, 05:25

I have 2 large pimelodus blochii and have no issues with them eating other fish other than feeder goldfish. They are housed with atleast a dozen cories. My pims are 8-10inches long so they are big enough to eat the cories but they don't seem to bother them. Sometimes the cories will swim all over the pims like they are cleaning them.

Post by **medaka** » 30 Nov 2005, 23:57

The cory's should come to no harm, if one of your pims decided to attempt to eat one, it would only try once, Cory's instinctively will errect their dorsal fin and stiffen out their pectoral fins when something grabs them,in doing so the cory's get lodged in the mouth/throat of the aggressor, which in turns spits them out, and usually then leaves the corys alone.

but if the corys are on the smallish side a large pim may be able to swallow one without it getting lodged in its mouth/throat. But adult C. robineae would be large enough.
Also regarding feeder fish? are you experiencing problems getting your pim ornatus to accept frozen food, earthworms etc, I never had a problem in getting P. ornatus to accept alternatives to 'feeder fish' imho live fish should only be offered when a preditory fish will not take other 'food' stuff's

snowball · Post by **snowball** » 01 Dec 2005, 00:35

Thanks for the replies, that is encouraging to hear. The C. robineae would probably be the smallest cats that go in with them, I wouldn't want to risk any of the smaller ones I have such as C. adolfi which I hope to breed one day

I don't actually have the P. ornatus yet, I'm just doing my homework as I've never kept any of these sort of SA cats larger than a Pimelodella gracilis and so I'm not too familliar with their habits.

Keeping the small tetras as feeder fish was just an idea, the black widows are cheap and plentiful and I thought if there were easy prey on offer the ornatus might ignore the small cats - but from the sounds of it this will not be a problem.

Anyway if I do decide to get an ornatus it wont be until I have set up a larger tank in the new year - no point adding anything before I make the change over. In any case I would like to give the Pink-tails (Chalceus erythrurus) a bit more time to grow as I'm rather attached to them and would hate for them to be eaten. They've doubled their size from 2" to 4"SL in the past two months and I'm hoping they'll be big enough to live with an ornatus by the time it comes around.

Post by **medaka** » 02 Dec 2005, 00:15

just another thought over feeding now that you mention

(Chalceus erythrurus)

When you you get your Pim, if you feed prawns once or maybe twice a week (depending on your feeding regimes)the pink tails as well as the Pim should eat the prawns, the result after a while, will be that the pink in there tails should become more intense