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since I'm out in the dark from wich river exactly my other 2 Indian fishes are, question for the Asian experts:

wich species of catfish dwell together with Etroplus canarensis and Barilius canarensis?

or can anyone tell me the name of that river, so I can root around on fishbase for a bit ;)

Nethravathi and Kumaradhara are the names of the rivers. I know people have collected an Ompok Sp species from these rivers.

How bout some nice Mystus species to keep 'em company??? Perosnally collected the head of a Mystus Sp. Thats bout it. Mystus canarensis / malabaricus maybe???

Looking at Fisbase, Barilius canarensis appear to be found in a big area of India along the east coast [quite possibly elsewhere too].

That Etroplus are all found in a fairly small area near Mangalore - not a typo, it's NOT Bangalore [but that may of course be a case of "no one looked anywhere else" - there are only four specimens in museums - most of them in Sweden].

Coordinates where Etroplus are found:
13.06, 75.03
(Plop that into Google maps and it shows you the location in India)

--
Mats

Dono bout B.canarensis but I can assure you to a great degree that the E.canarensis is not found around Bangalore.

that's a bummer; those 2 rivers are not on the list of the fishbase ecosystems

adding mystus will be tricky; some mystus get very large, also: mystus are rare as hens' teeth here in the trade.

I've seen a fair number of species at Pier aquatics and elsewhere in England that I have never seen before, and another ew that I haven't seen for 10-15 years

if there's a smaller mystus species that lives in or near those rivers I think Germany is a fair bet to get some.

haven't kept Mystus in ages......it's goin Old Skool

sidguppy wrote:
haven't kept Mystus in ages......it's goin Old Skool

Only as old school as Priest!!!!!

You can keep one Mystus malabaricus with 'em. Dont grow huge and not overtly aggressive. I kept one with Pangio kuhlii till very very recently and there were no issues.


Ps : Im gonna threaten you with physical harm to keep a Mystus in the tank if need be.

Mystus are indeed available in this country from time to time. Not sure I've seen M. malabricus or M. canarensis tho. In fact, Cat-eLog doesn't have M. canarensis at all!

--
Mats

Indian Mystus are entangled in a huge bowl of beaver c**p at the moment. The Dark One's article on Mystus will help clear certain doubts.

Hang on a second, the author credited to M. canarensis is a S. Grant - The Dark One's real name is Steve Grant - surely this is not a coincidence... ;)

--
Mats

I'm curious how this will work out.

I think I can get a fair number of fish, or at least the next best thing, to build up a nice biotope tank.
It's probably not exactly the right species; but that river has Garra's. I have a shoal of baby Garra rufa still in my pool; I ditch the Ancistrus and add the Garra's as well.

with some smaller catfish, the Garra's, the Barilius and the Etroplus it'll be a great tank.

a first impression.
mind I ain't no photographer and it's a quarantaine tank.
wich means no clean windows and crappy furniture.
the water is clean, oxygen rich and with a fair current, though. there's a mini pond eheim in that tank.

also: these fish are constantly on the move! and finally; ever tried to take a pick with flash of a tinfoil hat? it's a bit like that








I'll wait till Neil chaims in, though

still not sure if it's Barilius barna, Barilius bakeri, Barilius canarensis, Barilius sp 'Heiko 1' or even something else

I forgot to write down the name that was on the tank......

I know where you can find Mystus mysticetus. I even know 2 places where you can find them but at one place they only have males.

Mystus mysticetus is the wrong species, as it comes from Thailand.

that's true, but they are small and available.

sidguppy wrote:still not sure if it's Barilius barna, Barilius bakeri, Barilius canarensis, Barilius sp 'Heiko 1' or even something else

These look closest to Opsarius canarensis, but without looking at them in more detail it is hard to be 100%.

From a book : "Greenish above,golden on flanks with a double row(rarely single row) of large vertical blue spots along the body). Fins grey with broad white margins".

This is what B.canarensis is supposed to look like.

I have a friend who keeps Batasio travancoria,Noemachilicthys rupelli, a Garra Sp and Puntius narayani with his E.canarensis. You get any Puntius species in your LFS???

Edit : Forgot you are in the UK on a trip now. My suggestion is Puntius arulius or Puntius filamentosus if you can find 'em in the wondefully stocked shops over there.

actually, I bought these barbs on my last day and the pix were taken at home in the quarantaine tank; in the Netherlands

but Asians are available, save most catfishes.
getting loaches, Garra's or barbs from india will be much easier than getting the same from Africa!

there are at least 8 species of Garra in the trade with a bit of searching.
most species I've seen in the UK are also available here.
Puntius too; getting filamentosus is not hard, but this is a fairly large species.
a nice well bhaved docile fish, but it gets large.

I think the set up will be not as much species, but groups were it's supposed to do.

1 species of cichlid in a group (8 canarensis at present)
1 species of barb (the 12 Barilius)
1 species of algae eater (group of Garra)
1 killi perhaps (harem or group of Aplocheilus?)
oddballs.
these may be small spiny eels or a few small catfish of 1 species or a group of loaches or balitorae

I don't think I want more than 5 or 6 species in the tank.


now I know that somewhere on the net there's a travellers notebook of a few Indian fishhobbyists with a number of pictures, including several of non Etroplus.
anyone know how it's called or has a link?
I believe they actually put a specieslist in there with whatever they found in those rivers.

anyone know how it's called or has a link?

http://indianaquariumhobbyist.com/community/

Tnx, HH!

there it is.....
http://indianaquariumhobbyist.com/downl ... rensis.pdf


I must say, several fish in their catches definitely appeal to me and they are in the local trade here!
Puntius fasciatus


(Meso)Noemacheilus triangularis


Parambassis wolffii turns up sometimes


Garra mullya is a fish I've seen for sale in Germany at Zoozajacs


funny thing though....no catfishes, or at least none in their catches!
I might end up with a catfish-free tank....

That Nemacheilus is absolutely beautiful! I would choose the Puntius or the Nemacheilus if I were you!

the Noemacheilus is a fish that would fit nicely, since it would be the only bottomdweller and Noemacheilus are contrary to for example Schistura quite peaceful.

although the puntius is a beauty, I think I'll keep just 1 species of barb.
the other barbs on their list (malabaricus, daniconius, filamentosus, mahekola etc) are either large or they're far less pretty than the fish I already have
;)

M.petrubanarecescui is another beautiful loach found in the same habitat as the E.canarensis. I dont think it has been exported for the trade though.

M.trianagularis sounds like a good choice. A beautiful loach that goes bonkers over live food.

The not too admired Pristolepis marginata too has been collected from this habitat.

The beauty of P.fasciatus depends on where they 're from. Some of the colour forms I have seen are fantastic!!!!

For example, the ones posted here : http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/view ... 26&t=28738

Pristolepis is fascinating, but I have never seen it in the trade over here!

not in all the years and I'm in it for some time now ;)

but the main inhabitat is the cichlid Etroplus canarensis. this is a very mildmannered species as cichlids go; so I will not add larger perciformes in there or any other agressive or even slightly territorial fish.

Noemacheilus are, however, rather sensitive towards heat in summer, and more generally, bad water conditions

Frankly, if you would skip the E canarensis , I would think the Noemachelus would be much more happy - the rest are smallish, more peacefull, and not such messy eaters as the cich lids are.

But I know you are searching for a community around the E canarensis, so skipping them is not an option

that's kinda silly; because if it wasn't for the Etroplus I wouldn't even start with keeping Asians......

my experience is that with loaches it depends on species and how good the filtration and watermovement are.
my filtration and watermovement are quite good; all of my tanks have plenty oxygen.

and I can safely assume that when a cichlid is caught in water that's 33'C and the loach is in the same net that loach can handle the temperatures just fine.....

check the link I posted, Bas

the species I mentioned are all caught in the same river!

we're talking about a river with an average depthy of 2 feet, so there won't be much differences.
and like the loaches, the Etroplus dwell near the ground; Etroplus is a grazer.

no I don't think temperature will be any issue, summer or winter.

I have a small group of M.triangularis at the moment and they survived one of the harshest summers ever. Ambient temperatures were hitting 40 C. Had a coupla fans to keep the tank temperature down.

They were not affected. I just ensured I fed 'em just a little more than I normally do.

You could go for Batasio travancoria as they are found thereabouts and make great companions for the E. canarensis. Rasbora daniconius and Puntius narayani are found in their type locality as well and can be used as dithers. We did spot some Mystus sp. there but I wouldn't hazard a guess as to what species they are.
Sicyopterus griseus is another interesting fish found in the same waters but I don't know if they make their way to the stores there.

You can see the P. narayani with E. canarensis in this pic
http://indianaquariumhobbyist.com/galle ... k.jpg.html

sidguppy wrote:I'm curious how this will work out.

I think I can get a fair number of fish, or at least the next best thing, to build up a nice biotope tank.
It's probably not exactly the right species; but that river has Garra's. I have a shoal of baby Garra rufa still in my pool; I ditch the Ancistrus and add the Garra's as well.

with some smaller catfish, the Garra's, the Barilius and the Etroplus it'll be a great tank.

a first impression.
mind I ain't no photographer and it's a quarantaine tank.
wich means no clean windows and crappy furniture.
the water is clean, oxygen rich and with a fair current, though. there's a mini pond eheim in that tank.

also: these fish are constantly on the move! and finally; ever tried to take a pick with flash of a tinfoil hat? it's a bit like that








I'll wait till Neil chaims in, though

still not sure if it's Barilius barna, Barilius bakeri, Barilius canarensis, Barilius sp 'Heiko 1' or even something else

I forgot to write down the name that was on the tank......

The photos in this post are of great intrest to me, as I have two species of Barilius in my 540l tank (I did have two male Opsarius pulchellus aswell until they both very sadly died within six hours of each other, with very different looking yet mysterious problems, it was these two that hooked my intrest in fish back in March).

To me, your pictured Barilius look like my B. dogarsinghi, which max out at ~9cm SL, as they have ~7 vertical bars and a black blotch immediately before the caudial fin.

I have some mysterious Barilius of my own, that could very well be B. canarensis or the sp.2 bakeri discovered by Heiko bleher in recent times. The former grow to ~15cm SL, whereas the latter stay relatively small like B. dogersinghi at ~9cm SL. Both species were in in a tank labelled as "Mackeral Barbs" in Cadnam, Hampshire, allegedly supplied by a local breeder (yet the staff could not really give me much info at all, I seemed to know more about them!)

I shall try and upload some pics of my own within the next few days, as the stocking of my four tanks are all riverine fish fish with the exception of my Gymnochanda filamentosa and Pangio doriae. ;)