L090 papa

[sharn]

hello guys

after recently having a browse through a importers shed full of fish i came across this papa panaque, now ive always love panaques and this beast stole my heart. it was approximatly 25/30cm long excluding tail, rather wide and had very curly filaments on his tail this was labelled as a lyre tail panaque and after some reasarch i found out it was a papa. this fish is selling for 180 NZD, around 150 or so USD, is this a fair price?

anyway, onto the questions hehe

i would like to buy him if i have the appropriate set up for him and have a tank big enough as im not sure of eventual size? my tank is a 360L, 45cm wide and about 145cm long. the occupants would be if i got him (would have to get rid of two fish, a pleco and a bicolour) would be a oscar and a severum. the oscar is pretty placid and doesnt mind me adding tank mates as long as it aint the same species however he will give the fish the odd chase, bump or nip but nothing anything major, only torn fins at most.

i have read that being wild caught (i assume he is as all the other fish were from peru) they can be hard to get them to eat with boisterous fish around?

i have also read they are similar to royals in needing their wood and the wood in the oscar tank is quite soft so i assume it would be good for him? he would also get veggies and algae wafers. normally peas, lettuce and corgette as veggies? would he need anything else? also how often do these need feeding?

now my tap water is pretty soft, the oscar tank has a ph of around 7, kh of 3 and gh of 4. temp is sitting at 26C right now and has 30% weekly water changes which i dont mind upping if need be. it has 3000lph worth of filtration. would these params be suitable? the importers tanks were, to put it nicely, not that clean.

i have never kept fancy plecos before and have always wanted one or two, however knowledge before fish i say so i thought itd be best to check up first to see if i could give him a good home

thanks guys!

[MatsP]

1. Your fish should have plenty of wood in the tank. Several different types is better (gives the fish a choice, so if it doesn't like one kind, it's got something else to choose from). Getting them to eat may be a problem if they haven't been fed for many days - they tend to go into a non-eating mode and get stuck there. Boisterous fish obviously won't help on the stress levels, and as you probably know, if you're stressed, you're not exactly more inclined to eat well...

2. I think a 25-30cm Panaque should withstand a Oscar. Not sure why you say you need to remove the bi-colour - is that a Corydoras bicolor, or the red-tailed "shark"? Either would be OK with a large panaque, I'm sure. A common pleco is probably no big deal either, as long as they each have their own little spaces...

3. This fish grows to about 40cm TL. It's already a bit on the large side for your tank-size (45cm -> around 22 cm long fish max size according to the 4L x 2L x 2L minimum measure, where L is the length of the fish). As a temporary solution, your tank is fine, but eventually this fish will be needing a MUCH larger tank - and probably meaning a custom built tank, which would need a bottom area of around 70 cm x 150 cm minmum. Make sure you have some sort of acceptable way to achieve this before you take on a fish like that, particularly considering it's far from inexpensive...

4. Your water seems to be just right for this type of fish. You may need to increase water change volume - best to monitor the nitrate levels.

5. Question on prices are always difficult to answer - they are very dependant on local availability and local demand. If this is a sought after fish in your area, then it's going to be more expensive, unless it's also commonly imported - but if it's rarely imported because no-one is asking for it, it will be slightly less expensive. Also bear in mind that fish this big is probably shipped one or two in one box, whilst for example neons are shipped 250 in a bag, four bags to a box - shipping cost per box is the same for one or two fish or a thousand fish in a box...

--
Mats

[Waldo]

It's rather sad we don't see more of a variety in stores for these fish. I love the L090's

[sharn]

more wood wouldnt be a problem, got a few large pieces soaking in the spare 4x2x2 in the garage. i am far from up on my wood types, theyre just different colour browns and both quite soft. if this fish wasnt eating would it be hard to get it to start again?

would want to remove the common (read they grow around 50-60cm though i took this one in after a person gave up fish keeping and it hasnt grown much at all, it was about 18cm when i got it but came from a 60x30x30cm tank, maxing 20cm now but man does it eat its courgette ) and the shark because all of those fish in that tank would IMO be over stocked. it would be, if i kept them all and got this one, a oscar (25cm excluding tail), severum (20 odd ex tail), shark (13 or so ex tail), pleco which doesnt grow (20cm max ex tail) and the other pleco

i contacted the importer about him and he seems to think he hasnt been eating the wood at all, i didnt check to see how plump he was or anything and hes 3 hours drive (i would definatly drive to collect him if i got him) so not too sure id be able to make it up there to have a look this is the only shipment from peru in around 5 years, this is a one off shipment so will probably be my only chance to get this beautiful beast

i have a 130x60x60cm tank in the garage which i have as a spare just incase tanks break, fish snap and dont like each other etc etc but its not set up at the moment. im not sure i would be allowed to set it up, IF i do decide to get him after digging up every page on the net about this fish will it be sufficient? he would most likely be the only fish in there. it would be sad to have such a beautiful creature out in the garage where i would hardly see it but like you said, dont think hed be happy long term in my 360L, i might have to start sucking up to mother, i mean after all, it would have to be cycled, heated and have good filtration if any fish had to be housed in there anyway right, even if it was only on a temporary basis

[sharn]

ok, so ive been doing some more googling and all the papas i see have white tails heres a link from the site of the person that imports them http://www.newzealanddiscus.com/photos.htm

looks exactly the same but with longer, curlier filaments and is much bigger now

[StiffMeister]

i'd go get asap! it can easily be held in your tank for the time being. As these fish arent that active, a 360L will be fine. just make sure your filtration is up to the job as these fish produce a lot of poo. Make sure your filter (without powerheads) does at least 3-4 times the tank volume in an hour. do regular water changes and like mentioned above, check nitrates regularly. make sure you give him the hard wood. you also have the softer pieces and he will eat that in a short while. that he doesnt eat it there doesnt mean he wont eat it at all.
Do keep in mind that these bigger plecs will cause a lot of stress on your other plecs/bottomfish. they can be very dominant. some plecs will mix fine but others will get freaked out. you can try them both in that tank but if it doesnt work out, be prepared to take action.
what are you waiting for!! go get it!! and post pics asap

[sharn]

shuush SM, your getting me overly excited lol!!

im running 3000lph on my 360L for my oscar cause theyre internals and they need around that so filtration wont be a prob, if i get some spare cash i might just chuck a external on it too and ditch the smaller internal (1000lph).

i have a very hard piece of wood in the discus tank i could chuck in while my other bits are soaking, its very small but at least it would be something right? the larger hard piece in the discus tank id like to keep for the BN and the discus like to hide behind it sometimes.

the smaller plec in there is a real woose, he doesnt come out much at all so i think he would get bullied, hes a common that doesnt grow, stunted i think from the tank before, im so bad at parting with fish but i think id have to get rid of him

ill see what i can do within the next few weeks about making the trip up to auckland, not sure if ill be able to make it and i dont really trust a courier company with a fish of this size, it wont fit in a bag thats for sure ooooh, come to think of it mums sisters birthday is next month and she lives just up the road from the person... she wasnt going to go but... ill see what i can do hehe.

p.s. is this a L090? the pics ive seen make me think otherwise but another plec fan told me thats what it was