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Hey guys,

I walked into walmart and found a tank of bristlenose. Here is a link to some pics:

http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forum ... p?t=191905

The fish looks similiar to the first pic of L089.

thanks for the help.

John

But perhaps even more like ? Not to mention that these are bred in the millions by commercial breeders and amateurs.

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Mats

Notice the strong white stripe in the end of the tail. Plus as I understand it walmart gets all of its plecos from wild caught.

John

i thought walmart and petco and petsmart got all their fish from segrest farms? in florida?

http://www.segrestfarms.com/

andywoolloo wrote:i thought walmart and petco and petsmart got all their frish from segrest farms? in florida?

http://www.segrestfarms.com/

No they dont well not all of them. Petsmart has its own facility now out west for a large number of there fish. And petco now owns seagrest and have been removing/canceling all of the walmart contracts. The walmart these came from gets its fish from sunpet. The fish were ordered as the "regular" small plecos not bristlenose.

Also segrest imports a good portion of its fish. It is defiently a cool place to be the day the shipments come in. I have gotten some pretty cool things from them.

John

jrpatter wrote:Notice the strong white stripe in the end of the tail. Plus as I understand it walmart gets all of its plecos from wild caught.

John

First of all, I find it EXTREMELY unlikely that Walmart would only sell wild-caught plecos. Is there any documented evidence of that? Walmart likes to make money (as far as I understand), and captive bred fish is easier to handle because they are generally more adapted to captivity. If they are also bred in the USA, they will be shipped only in domestic transport, which reduces the cost of the fish.

Second, I see nothing that contraindicates the suggestion of A. cf_cirrhosus Juveniles have a very clear white band on the end of the caudal (tail) fin, and another band of white on the caudal peduncle (where the caudal fin starts). As they grow older, the marking on the caudal fin often disappears. But your fish look fairly small (about 2"), so I'd expect them to have a noticeable band there.

Edit: Another look at the Ancistrus sp L089, and I can say for certain that the Walmart fish isn't that. L089 has a irregular spots all over the body, a reticulated pattern. Ancistrus cf_cirrhosus has rounded spots on the head that grows more irregular oval/oblong the further back on the body they are. Which matches your fish perfectly.

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Mats

There are several species looking similar to the common Ancistrus shipped out from Brazil, it could be for example L378 from Rio Gurupi if compared to the picture in Ingo's new book. I dont agree to give the common Ancistrus any name making people thinking it's related to A. cirrhosus when this species is and will always be impossible to give any name at all...but I dont have any other idea what to call them instead.
I also think it's little danger to refer always to the common Ancistrus for the similarity when the common Ancistrus is so variable, there are to many species looking alike imported from South America and there are a huge risk that we will see many more crossbreds in the future then we do now. If not knowing their origin, treat them as a different species and dont mix them with the common Ancistrus would be my advice.

Janne

Edit,
The picture of the L378 in the Cat-eLog if compared to the picture in Ingo's new book seems to origin from Rio Caeté but both share the same L-number.

Janne,

Are you trying to say that you do not think it's likely that Walmart is selling the common, tank-bred variety of bristlenose, or are you complaining about the change from A. sp(3) to A. cf. cirrhosus?

I agree that there is a number of different fish that are similar to the common, tank-bred variety. However, I also think they are less common in the trade, and would normally be sold under a "wild-caught" label simply because that will bring in more money.

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Mats

However, I also think they are less common in the trade, and would normally be sold under a "wild-caught" label simply because that will bring in more money.

I dont know if I would express me like that, several WC Ancistrus species is shipped out in very large quantitys from Manaus each week and the market can easily sell them among others, to US they can ship larger quantitys per box and they are very sheap. The final price will not differ so much as we think, it's much more expensive to ship to Europe and Asia and even here they are not so much more expensive then the common Ancistrus. It's also like this that wholesalers sell more Ancistrus then they can buy from breeders, only in Sweden each year the hobby "consume" somewhere between 200-300.000 common Ancistrus...how many do you think is sold in United States each year? So Walmart is of course selling a lots of common Ancistrus but also quite many WC Ancistrus.

or are you complaining about the change from A. sp(3) to A. cf. cirrhosus?

Yes...that too

Janne

Funny that. I wish I knew a wholesaler who wishes to buy Ancistrus babies, as I have a lot of them...

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Mats

I once spoke to someone working for a walmart-equivalent. He told me they (small-town branch) sell about 50-100 "common" Ancistrus per week, loads of them wild-caught as they cannot get enough captive bred specimens. WC are neither speccially marked nor priced.

Brown bristlenoses are cheap "cleaners" so nobody bothers to ID them correctly. In most cases it won't be possible to ID anything that comes as common bristlenose. There are so many species that look very much alike, and unless you know the exact location where they were caught, there is not much you can do.

L89 is "problematic", as there are 3 different species (L89, A. spec. "Wabenmuster", A. tamboensis) that are all sold under one of these three names. But none is your fish.

I agree with Mats on this one.

As the fish matches the common Ancistrus morphologically, and is not labelled up as wild-caught, I see no justification for accepting it as such.

I can usually spot a tank full of wild Ancistrus very easily, they are larger (often adult) and less uniform in size. The tank bred fish are usually juveniles and frequently all the same size.

i have never seen BN wild or nt at the walmart in my town, just starving to death commons with algae wafers inches away on the shelf, but that's a whole other story,

I am so going to check out walmart right now before work, I have never seen a wild caught anything I do not think!

Those look like Commons to me.

All below is from Manaus WC. And some 20 cm from Manaus too. And I have more species pictured from Manaus, even som pictures of species similar to the common Ancistrus from both Peru, Colombia and Ecuador. I have become much more careful to ID Ancistrus species the more I discover new species, I dont say that these in the first post is not the common one I just say they could be something else.

Janne

I agree that there is lots of similar Ancistrus species (and that is probably playing a part in the difficulty in naming the common variant too - as it MAY be that what is sold in different areas have different origin, as well as the possibility of hybridization in the lineage as well).

But the fact is that I find those to be more likely to turn up in smaller stores, not Walmart, as those fish are more likely to come into the importers that deal with the more exotic variants.

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Mats

I have sold to Segrest and Sunpet and they can buy common bushys from Florida or import them from the wild even cheaper.I got some commons from columbia about a month ago for 50cent for 3-4" that looked great.Petco does not own segrest,but segrest does supply part of there franchise.Segrest farms is owned by the Rockerfeller family as of about 4yrs ago,then they bought out sunpet,blue springs,norton tampabay fisheries,and then this summer they bought out ekkwell to be largest guys in the business in the states they all retained their names but are owned by the rockerfellers.I would say these are wild caught from my best guess,no one down here produces large enough volume to supply wal-mart even though they could use both supplys incase their was a shortage.The big box stores do not normally carry common bushys because the employs sell them as common plecos instead of bushys and they lose money.

Well that is what makes this interesting. Who ever supplied the walmart messed up. The bushynose were shipped to the walmart as common plecos. That is why I was trying to figure out what kind they were.

John

Ok, so it's unlikely that they are any "exotic" Ancistrus species, I'm afraid - they may not be the common variety that we get, but they look very much like them (more so than any of the ones Janne posted - no disrespect to Janne's comments and knowledge - he knows a lot more than me on the subject). which means that they aren't "valueable", even if they aren't the same species - because no one can ever tell the difference (except by DNA testing or some such - when are we going to get "DIY DNA tests", anyone?).

Without a capture location to limit the number of possibles (and that is a huge part in the problem of identifying the common bristlenose too), we can't really say what the species is. And if they aren't what it said on the bag, then it's going to be even more difficult to find out where they came from.

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Mats

None of the pictures of wild-caught Ancistrus look like the Ancistrus in the first post.

The Ancistrus in the first post look exactly like Ancistrus cf. cirrhosus, ie Common Ancistrus, right down to the gradually larger spots from the nose back and the almost complete band around the caudal peduncle.

Common Ancistrus are bred in enormous numbers, and I find it difficult to believe that Walmart would find it cheaper to buy WC Ancistrus than get bred ones, but I suppose it's possible. However, I'd be willing to bet $10 that the fish in the first photos are Commons.

so what you're saying is they have Bn in with the common pl*cos?
that's makes more sense.

But the fact is that I find those to be more likely to turn up in smaller stores, not Walmart, as those fish are more likely to come into the importers that deal with the more exotic variants.

Common Ancistrus are bred in enormous numbers, and I find it difficult to believe that Walmart would find it cheaper to buy WC Ancistrus than get bred ones, but I suppose it's possible. However, I'd be willing to bet $10 that the fish in the first photos are Commons.

It's easy to think that common Ancistrus are bred in such huge numbers that no WC is needed in the business, but that is not really correct, the larger chain of stores the more likely it's that they buy huge amounts of WC fishes...even Ancistrus because breeders have no chance to deliver that amount of quantity in time every week. Small wholesalers or stores is the smallest customers when it comes to buy WC fishes but they do sometimes buy the species that is not so easy to sell.

None of the pictures of wild-caught Ancistrus look like the Ancistrus in the first post.

Maybe not, it was just to show there exist similar species exported in huge amounts to wholesalers around the world...not any attempt to ID the first post.

The Ancistrus in the first post look exactly like Ancistrus cf. cirrhosus, ie Common Ancistrus, right down to the gradually larger spots from the nose back and the almost complete band around the caudal peduncle.

The pictures is not of that quality that they can be ID for a certain species, better pictures is needed. Just because the common Ancistrus is so common dont exclude all similar species exported from South America.
If we always ID all grey - brownish with a light band around the caudal peduncle as common Ancistrus without very good pictures we will make many mistakes, we will also increase the risk for much more crossbreedings in the future.

John, you can compare your species with this picture of the "European Common Ancistrus", there are of course colour varitys but this is how they looks like...if you consider your species similar it's a common and if not...maybe it's a "US Common Ancistrus" or a WC Ancistrus.
Janne

Edit,
More pictures of common Ancistrus can be found here...but the Australia type ;)

Walmart will combine any and everything in their too small and too overcrowded tanks.
I would not buy any fish from them although I sometimes by their ghost glass shrimp since my local WalMart used to have them for only $0.19 each. They are closing that store and building a WalMart Super store diagonally across from what was my quiet neighborhood! I almost can't believe this is happening but it's hard to deny when I look out the window and see the walls going up. I guess I won't have far to go for my shrimp.
They recently closed out their fish department but this new larger store will probably have a fish dept so we'll see if they get something interesting in once in a while.
The long established LFS and Pet store reports a tremendous drop in business related to the current economic crises. Historically, the mom and pop fish shops often fared better than some nonessential businesses because many people will spend on less expensive hobbies like fish but this time seems different and more fundamentally bad.

Janne wrote: It's easy to think that common Ancistrus are bred in such huge numbers that no WC is needed in the business, but that is not really correct

Well, perhaps that is the case in the US, but commons are commercially bred in vast numbers in Europe, wild caught brown Ancistrus here in Europe are outnumbered in the trade by Commons by, I'd say, four or five orders of magnitude, and when WC's are available they do not tend to be sold as Commons, because selling them as "WC Ancistrus sp. 'Peru'" means you can charge twice the price for them.

the larger chain of stores the more likely it's that they buy huge amounts of WC fishes

From what I've seen the large chain stores around here seem to buy the same SE-asia/czech-bred fish from the same german mega-wholesellers as everyone else. Again, maybe it's different in the US, I don't know.

Maybe not, it was just to show there exist similar species exported

And my point was that none of them looks like a Common. Sorry, but they don't.

The pictures is not of that quality that they can be ID for a certain species, better pictures is needed. Just because the common Ancistrus is so common dont exclude all similar species exported from South America.

No, it doesn't, but when something which looks exactly like a bog-standard Common is sold cheaply as a "Common Pleco" in a chain store, I'd say it's a good bet it really is a Common. Yes, chains seem to use some sort of lottery system when it comes to labelling the fish in their tanks, but as far as I can tell the only thing suggesting these particular fish are NOT Commons is the assumption that chain stores don't sell captive-bred ancistrus.

Mike wrote:Well, perhaps that is the case in the US, but commons are commercially bred in vast numbers in Europe, wild caught brown Ancistrus here in Europe are outnumbered in the trade by Commons by, I'd say, four or five orders of magnitude, and when WC's are available they do not tend to be sold as Commons, because selling them as "WC Ancistrus sp. 'Peru'" means you can charge twice the price for them.

You cant compare Sweden either with US or the rest of Europe, but even here there are almost weekly imports of WC Ancistrus. But you are right that common Ancistrus is most common in our country and our neighbors.

Mike wrote:From what I've seen the large chain stores around here seem to buy the same SE-asia/czech-bred fish from the same german mega-wholesellers as everyone else. Again, maybe it's different in the US, I don't know.

Most large chain stores in Scandinavia buy their fish from Swedish wholesalers, not all but most of them.

Mike wrote:Yes, chains seem to use some sort of lottery system when it comes to labelling the fish in their tanks, but as far as I can tell the only thing suggesting these particular fish are NOT Commons is the assumption that chain stores don't sell captive-bred ancistrus.

If the WC Ancistrus looks little special in some way...they are often sold like you say, a little more expensive and labeled as WC Ancistrus "Peru" as one example, all other WC that are grey, brown just looking like nothing else then a common is sold as "Ancistrus" or "Pleco"...and the chainstores is of course selling both bred and WC Ancistrus but often you dont know which is which.

This is my opinion and everyone else is free to have their own, all I say is if we ID all these dull and boring Ancistrus looking similar to the common Ancistrus...we will just increase the problem and discussions like this will be much more frequently common in the future.

Janne

Janne,

I really value your input in this discussion, and I'm by no means saying that you are wrong.

Maidenhead aquatics is probably the largest chain-store with a "fish only target" in the UK with 81 shops according to their web-site.
Pets at Home is clearly larger, but generally have only a small section of very common fish(the only Loricariidae I've regularly seen there are Pterygoplichthys pardalis, marked as Hypostomus plecostomus), and I've only rarely seen them stock Ancistrus (small juveniles at that time). They have some 210+ shops according to their website.

When I enquired about the origin of a tankfull of semi-mature, Common-looking, bristlenoses, the answer was that they were "tank-raised". I have not asked in EVERY shop of Maidenhead aquatics, every time I'eve been there, but it appears that large chains do not ALWAYS buy wild-caught stock for "common looking" Ancistrus. That's of course not to say that they do not SOMETIMES do that.

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Mats

Common Ancistrus from the Cat-eLog, contributor Ingo Seidel.


WC Ancistrus from Manaus. I think they are quite similar, maybe not 100% for experts like us ;)

Ancistrus cirrhosus, similar but not as much as the above species.

Another similar to the common; Ancistrus sp "Colombia"

Mats wrote:When I enquired about the origin of a tankfull of semi-mature, Common-looking, bristlenoses, the answer was that they were "tank-raised". I have not asked in EVERY shop of Maidenhead aquatics, every time I'eve been there, but it appears that large chains do not ALWAYS buy wild-caught stock for "common looking" Ancistrus. That's of course not to say that they do not SOMETIMES do that.

I have never said that they ALWAYS buy wild-caught stock for "common looking" Ancistrus, I have said that they buy both and of course if they have a good supplier they buy most bred Ancistrus...but they do buy WC Ancistrus.
I have no idea how large the market is in Great Brittain but I do know little more about the US market and I know almost all about the Scandinavia market.

In the Cat-eLog there are 129 species of Ancistrus listed and there is still many left to be "discovered", in my view there are no way to ID the first post to be a common Ancistrus and we should be very careful with identification of Ancistrus species without any information looking similar to the common.

Janne