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Hi!

Ive had these common bristlenose Ancistrus for a year now and i am really starting to wonder about their size. The male has grown about 1 cm since i bought him and he is ~8 cm same with female. Afaics theyve stopped growing.
Theyre housed in a 77 litre tank with hard water and a neutral pH.
Is there a dwarf species?

*bump*

doesnt anybody have a clue what kind of ancistrus this could be?

That's because we cannot see the pic...says we don't have permission.

Sorry didnt know until you told me...





I might have to add that both m/f have the white dorsal fintip like the babys have.

Hi,
what´s about Ancistrus claro?
I think you know the article (of Mike Hemman?) in the Datz (2002?).

Aren't the males of <i>A. claro</i> supposed to have a more mottled coloration, rather than the spotted pattern in the pic?

OK,
Heok Hee, you´re right
BTW:
Has anyone translatet the work of Sonja Muller from French to German or English? Or is anyone able to do it?

hi isnt dat L144?? The one next to the golden bristlenose dat isnt albino Im not sure

The fish has a mottled pattern close to the caudal. And the spots are very goldish yellow when he gets aroused. I tried to measure him through the glas today and he is 6.5 cm tl!

The first fish i posted definately isnt L144 as i have 2.

Hi!

This topic is still bothering me...although i know there wont be a sollution...

The adults havent grown a millimeter since i posted...staying at 6.5 cm.

They both still have the light corners on the caudal fin. Not white but a light gray tone.
Ive never had more than 30 fry from them...sometimes even only around 10.
The male has a spotted belly if this might help.
lmuch more destinct spots on adult...this is a 3.5 cm offspring

Hi,

Those look very much like the common bristlenose catfish we get here in australia. I was told that they were Ancistrus temmincki but as with most trade acquired ancistrus, this may be inaccurate and there may in fact be many species being sold here under the common name.

The ones I have grow fast when young, but slow down once they get to the size you mentioned. However, they do grow to approximately 15cm in size eventually. If you are mainly feeding vegetable matter it may pay to feed them high protein pellets. This is what ours feed on, in addition to zuchinni.

HTH

Hi!

Can anyone with access to the A.temincki description(Achim or HH) please tell me what the size mentioned is? And what it says about the color pattern.

According to Fishbase, which got its data from CLOFFSCA, tehy reach 9.8 cm SL. CLOFFSCA is unpublished as of yet, but supposedly very accurate.

Rusty

CLOFFSCA is unpublished as of yet

CLOFFSCA IS published. I seen a copy of it with my own two eyes during the Manaus meeting.
Trying to find out more info about how to purchase a copy (last I heard, it's about $48).
FWIW, it's accurate name-wise, but tends to underestimate sizes of the fish, since the sizes were taken from the scientific literature (and scientists do not necessarily catch the biggest fish).

Hi,

i recently discussed this matter with Ingo.
Most Ancistrus species become much larger in nature than in the aquarium (up to ~30cm TL). Obviously there is something missing in the diet we present them in our tanks. Its similar with Baryancistrus and other mainly limnivore "non stop eaters". This missing subsequent flow of food is imo responsible for the dwarvism in captivity.
The species we keep as the common Ancistrus is nearly impossible to determine. The origin is unknown, there are a lot of very similar species with that colouration all over South America and a revision is still missing. The strain we have may even be a mixture of different "species".
Btw: The fish we know as Ancistrus hoplogenys is actually Ancistrus dolichopterus.

Achim

P.S.: Christian, i'll take a look if i have the description of A. teminckii

The original description of A. temminckii in Cuvier & Valenciennes (1840) states that the type is 4 Parisian inches (about 108 mm) long (probably TL), and that the color of the fish in alcohol was a reddish-brown, with white undersides.
Not very helpful, I'm afraid.

Is anybody currently working on a revision of the Ancistrinae? Would Armbruster be the man ?

Jon is working on loricariid phylogeny, but he is not really into things at the species level. The Ancistrinae is not a monophyletic group and is now considered part of the Hypostominae.
According to the ACSI page, he's one of the five working on Ancistrus.