Sexing L-204 , Mature size and Cave size

Tor Egil · Post by **Tor Egil** » 17 Mar 2006, 20:08

I have bought 3 L-204 in the last weeks hoping to get a pair to try too breed. They range from 7-11cm , not including tails. Are they likely too be mature and able start to breed at that size?
I also have 2 bamboo caves 5cm wide and about 20cm long. Is this a good size or to big for them? The smallest has been using one of the caves ocassionaly, but the two others has shown no interest in the caves.
The 2 biggest Panaques seems to be friends in a way, the spend much time close to each other, and I have not noticed them chasing each other around. Is this a sign that the are different sexes, or at least not two males? I bougt the big one less than a week ago and it seems like his spikes have grown i the last few days, 2-3mm long now on the tailend.

Tank size is 120L
PH-7,5
Temp 28
KH-3
GH-?
[img]http://photobucket.com/albums/c266/Davr ... ¤t=204.jpg[/img]

Line · Post by **Line** » 18 Mar 2006, 23:42

Hejsa Tor

I think they need a size of about 11-12 cm without tail.
At this size my male developed his Odontodes, got interested in caves and so on..
The females a little smaller.
Cave Size is fine in my opinion.
4,5 cm as Entrance is for my male absolutely minimum.

One of my females usually always close to the male.

Best regards
Line

njfishguy · Post by **njfishguy** » 19 Mar 2006, 17:05

I'm also interested in breeding these guys and have been keeping a few for about 2 years. One is about 4.5" or 11cm and showing the "hairy" male characteristics on rear flanks of the fish and has staked out a cave. Not sure if other fish is female or sub-dominant male, but it is slightly larger (about 5" or 13cm) and slightly darker but showing no signs of rounding that I would expect from a female. Others I have are too small to guess.

I'm feeding green squash, flakes, shrimp pellets, algae wafers and some live blackworms. What are others feeeding?

MatsP · Post by **MatsP** » 20 Mar 2006, 10:06

njfishguy: Do you have any wood in the tank - this is the primary food-source in nature for these fish, so you should have a few branches of some sort of wood - it doesn't appear to make much differnce what kind, as long as you stay away from certain ones that are known to be poisonous (cedar for example). Aquatic driftwood (as they sell in the shops) works fine, as does branches of fruit-trees (cherry, apple, plum, pear, etc), leafy trees that you normally find in the park/forest (beech, birch, oak, walnut, chestnut, maple, etc), etc, etc. I would stay away from cypress, juniper, pine, fir, and such, since they have high resin content, which may not be good for the water...

Dried wood needs water-logging for a while to sink properly (anything from a couple of days to several weeks, depending on type of wood and dryness). Do this in a bucket of suitable size, and change water every day or so to make sure you don't get any nastyness. You may also want to boil the wood for a bit.

--
Mats

njfishguy · Post by **njfishguy** » 21 Mar 2006, 02:34

Thanks Mats...
Yes I do have driftwood in the tank... I have no idea what kind but I got it from a shop. The two larger L-204s are housed in a 20g long with a power head for good circulation. Only other occupants are a few corys.
NJfishguy

njfishguy · Post by **njfishguy** » 25 Mar 2006, 19:01

Do both sexes make fanning motions with their fins, or is that something only males display?

Waldo · Post by **Waldo** » 28 Mar 2006, 07:17

I've witnessed mutual dancing near the entrance of a cave. Even at 8-9cm they expressed a willingness to play the game. There are records of them spawning in the home aquaria and I think all that is required is a little patience, both sexes, and the proper diet. Someone that takes the time should be able to make some money breeding them and I don't think they will be harder then bushynose. People should definatly consider a less domestic fish when considering what they want to breed.

grfdc · Post by **grfdc** » 29 Jan 2007, 03:04

Hello all pleco fanatics! Anyone here have any success breeding L-204's? What were the water conditions? What did you feed them?

In regards to husbandry, what do the fry eat? Can you start them on zucchini?

I currently have 5 L-204's in a 55gal tank that are between 1.5-2" long. Lots of driftwood and water movement. 83-84 degrees F and 6.5-7.0 pH. I've kept several species of plecos in the past and the L-204's seem to have a preternatural "zucchini-radar". I would imagine the fry like it too.

When mine get mature enough and they start to do something interesting besides eat and poop, I'll keep y'all posted. Selah.

Greg Findura
Essex Co., NJ

grfdc · Post by **grfdc** » 01 Feb 2007, 02:25

No one? Well, I'll just have to be the first one on here to breed these beauties. Now, if you will excuse me, it's time to prepare more zucchini.

-Greg

MatsP · Post by **MatsP** » 01 Feb 2007, 11:23

If you look in the Cat-eLog for L204, you'll see pictures of babies there... Like this one:

Photo credit: Janne Ekström

So, someone has bred them. I think there was another thread with posts by Janne somewhere giving some details. But he's also been known to write articles for magazines, and if you want to get paid for the articles, you'd better not give them to be published on the web (or write too many details on the web) before the article has been published - because the magazine want to give you something that isn't already available somewhere else, right? I think Jools has been promised a write-up from Janne.

I'd say that they are similar to other small Panaque and other small pleco's in general. Try a Forum search and perhaps a search on posts by Janne?

--
Mats

grfdc · Post by **grfdc** » 06 Feb 2007, 21:45

Mats,

Thanks for the words. I actually did do a forum search before posting that inquiry about successful breeders of L-204's. Since I found nothing with that search, I posted that post. I will try a search on Janne, however, and see what comes up.

But, what the heck? Is Janne a capitalist or something? Geez... withholding information from an online forum just to make some lousy bucks from a magazine? Who does he think he is? A delicate genius? He doesn't have enough beans as it is? Haha! And so much for that.

Thanks again for your suggestions.

-Greg Findura

Bwhiskered · Post by **Bwhiskered** » 07 Feb 2007, 00:14

My 6 L-204 Flash plecos were between 3 and 4 inches long when I bought them last February. They are now big enough to spawn and hopefully not far from it. At least 2 are now mature males 6"+ long not counting the filaments on the tail. The females are plump and about 5". A lot of sparing and chasing goes on but no spawning action as yet. They sure poop a lot and have a real love of Sera Catfish Chips. Maybe it is not their season to spawn.

apistomaster · Post by **apistomaster** » 07 Feb 2007, 05:35

Hi bewhiskered,
I have 8 big L204 and maybe only 3 females. Too bad we are at such a distance apart or we could do some match making. These males have very long tail tip filaments which adds to their attractiveness and they are full of personality. Not seen one every go into a cave yet. Maybe when they are ready to spawn but now is when they should be interested here in the Northern hemisphere.
For their size, definitely the messiest of my plecos.
They go through a large quantity of earthworm pellets, wood, bloodworms and live blackworms.

racoll · Post by **racoll** » 07 Feb 2007, 09:24

Thanks for the words. I actually did do a forum search before posting that inquiry about successful breeders of L-204's. Since I found nothing with that search, I posted that post. I will try a search on Janne, however, and see what comes up.

But, what the heck? Is Janne a capitalist or something? Geez... withholding information from an online forum just to make some lousy bucks from a magazine? Who does he think he is? A delicate genius? He doesn't have enough beans as it is? Haha! And so much for that.

grfdc, I'm sure Janne can stick up for himself, but I would like to point out that you may wish to do a bit more research before insulting someone.

Janne has written in detail in this Catfish of the Month article about breeding L204.

He has also contributed 802 posts, 6 articles and 152 images to the site so far. The accusation that he is withholding information is simply wrong.

Cristoffer Forssander · Post by **Cristoffer Forssander** » 07 Feb 2007, 10:10

If you look into GOC, "The nordic community of catfihes" http://www.goc.se and you'll find more information about L204 from Janne Ekström, in Swedish, but that woun't cause any bigger problem for you, I think

!

Regards
Cristoffer

MatsP · Post by **MatsP** » 07 Feb 2007, 10:42

Do you have a link for that article, as I couldn't find it... [Probably me not being very good at searching

]

Or did you mean the L204 "Data sheet" (corresponding to the Cat-eLog entry here?)

--
Mats

Promod · Post by **Promod** » 07 Feb 2007, 11:15

grfdc wrote:But, what the heck? Is Janne a capitalist or something? Geez... withholding information from an online forum just to make some lousy bucks from a magazine? Who does he think he is? A delicate genius? He doesn't have enough beans as it is? Haha! And so much for that.

This couldn?t be more far from the truth
Janne contributes frequently with his expert knowledge for free, not only in this forum but also on the Swedish catfish site http://www.goc.se

I think an apologize would be suitable.

Cristoffer Forssander · Post by **Cristoffer Forssander** » 07 Feb 2007, 11:45

Yes; I woulden't agree on that! Janne is very helpful and hes always willing to help out with information and knowledge! Hes resopnsible for most infromation abot fihes, he writes a lot of articels and is a frequent contributor at the forums for everyone!

The website is www:goc.se - Everything is in swedish, but a litte guiding to help others to the L204 is following:

1)www.goc.se

2)artregister

3) Bildsökning

4) Number 2 at the list of species below!

Then, everything is in Swedish.

Regards
Cristoffer

MatsP · Post by **MatsP** » 07 Feb 2007, 11:48

Indeed, I would please ask for Janne to accept MY appology for making him look like he wouldn't share some information because he would gain financially from witholding that information.

However, I think we all agree that if someone who contributes A LOT to our hobby has a chance to make some money by having an article published in a magazine, this should allow the delay of publishing the same information on the web (which I may have confused the L204 with some other species).

Janne is very helpfull, and will answer direct questions as best as he can (and he's often the ONLY one that can answer them).

[I have no idea about Janne's personal finances, but I'm pretty sure anything left over from the "usual" expenses of rent/mortgage, utilites bills etc, is probably spent on catfish and their upkeep.]

--
Mats

MatsP · Post by **MatsP** » 07 Feb 2007, 12:04

Cristoffer, I tried following the steps you described, but I don't get any pictures at all (just empty frames with a "broken image" in the corner).

I did "Artsökning" with L204 as "Handelsnamn/L-nummer", and that gives me a data-sheet, but no information on spawning -

Odling
Inga uppgifter finns om odling men är säkerligen grott lekare som övriga liknande arter.

.

For those that can't read Swedish, that says "No information on breeding, but is surely a cave-spawner like similar species".

[I was born in Sweden and lived there for over thirty years, until I decided that a computer job in England seemed like a good idea...]

--
Mats

Cristoffer Forssander · Post by **Cristoffer Forssander** » 07 Feb 2007, 12:17

MatsP wrote:Cristoffer, I tried following the steps you described, but I don't get any pictures at all (just empty frames with a "broken image" in the corner).

I did "Artsökning" with L204 as "Handelsnamn/L-nummer", and that gives me a data-sheet, but no information on spawning -
Odling
Inga uppgifter finns om odling men är säkerligen grott lekare som övriga liknande arter.
.

For those that can't read Swedish, that says "No information on breeding, but is surely a cave-spawner like similar species".

[I was born in Sweden and lived there for over thirty years, until I decided that a computer job in England seemed like a good idea...]

Indeed, you're right! My mistake!
I thought that this information was updated, but, I think Janne have a lot to do, and I know that he is working as much as he can on information. The information about L204 were in the Goc's magazine this year! Perhaps its possible to by older magazines! He wroted a really great artikle with a lot of quality images of L204!

I know that they are cavespawner, they need really good water quality and special care! I think that he just held L204 alone in the aquarium, 1 male and 2-3 females. The were breeding in specialmade pipes, the ones you can see on planetcatfish- L204. The pipes are * 3 the fish length, if I'm remember right!

Perhaps he will contribute with an english translation in time, as he have done with som other species! But everything is about having time!

I'm also sitting on some information about some species about breeding and so on, but it takes time to make everythig, esecieally if some one as Janne is responsible for GOC, or a you are aforum moderator

But he is really helpfull, so nothing is impossible!

Hope this have been to some use!

Cheers
Cristoffer

--
Mats

Mod edit: Fixed up "quote" tags. --Mats

Sexing L-204 , Mature size and Cave size

Sexing L-204 , Mature size and Cave size

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sexing L-204s

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