PlanetCatfish.com

I thought maybe this deserved a seperate post. I have been observing several Plecotomus in a small tributary of White Oak Bayou in Cypress, TX (NW Houston area). I have captured & released a few only to get photo images of them. I have observed them feeding in schools (adults & juvinile) on concrete rip-rap as a group during daylight hours. I thought this as unusual since they are known to feed mostly @ night. I have several images of the Plecos & the nesting holes in my album. I will continue to observe these guys to see what we can learn of their habbits.




Whitey's hole

Whitey

Goliath

pics dont work

Pics should work now, sorry. If they don't, just go to my album.

http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/albu ... er_id=6255

It seems that the Pterygoplichthys in Texas have been identified as either or P. disjunctivus.

Thanks Silurus,

I have noticed that the larger ones are all dark coloration. The lighter colored Liposarcus ambrosettii all seem to be about 30% smaller than the darker colored plecostomus. Both have been observed feeding together with juvinile Liposarcus pardalis.

Is the feeding during bright daylight (direct sun) unusual?

Nice pics SWoodRuff!

swoodruff wrote:I have noticed that the larger ones are all dark coloration. The lighter colored Liposarcus ambrosettii all seem to be about 30% smaller than the darker colored plecostomus. Both have been observed feeding together with juvinile Liposarcus pardalis.

Great pictures, these are excellent insights into how these fishes reproduce.

Males being darker and 30% larger than females is consistent with many other Loricariids, perhaps that's what you are seeing?

is the common hobby species, the others are pretty unlikely to end up in Texas.

Jools

There is one way that the commons can & have ended up in our waters. Unrespectful owners who release them into streams & bayous when they are tiered of caring for their ponds & also flooding (which we have had much of just 4-6 years ago, T.S. Allison, etc...) which could be how they come to be in our waters. Quite a few years ago, I saw a 20 inch koi in the same tributary just a week after a flood swimming into a drainage culvurt though I doubt he survived very long in these waters. There are lots of large snapping turtles & the more voratious alligator snapper that most probably made a few meals out of him. I have no doubt there could be more species of plecostomus than this one in there.