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How many,are to many?

Posted: 12 Sep 2011, 13:38
by Carter77
I've set up my tank with group of ten pleco, but have the bug.
There all small but would love to get more. The tanks a 190l juwel trigon.
1. Three beckon
2. Royal
3. Golden nugget
4.opal spot
5.saltan
6.green phantom
7. Blue phantom
8.starlight
9.vampire
10.mustard spot
What pleco just don't get on?

Re: How many,are to many?

Posted: 12 Sep 2011, 14:10
by MatsP
Getting along is to a large extent a question of maturity and number of hiding spaces, as well as "enough space for each fish" - that is, you can keep a larger number if they are juvenile, or you have lots of space to hide.

Clearly, some of the ones in your list will (or should) outgrow your tank's stocking capacity by a fair amount. They also have fairly different diet, which can cause problems, because the vegetarians need to get enough fibre in their diet. If you feed enough meaty food to ensure you get enough (Which I expect your "saltan" means: L264, Sultan pleco), (three beacon), (vampire), then your royal, gold nugget, mustard spot, starlight (Ancistrus sp?), L128 and L200 will potentially scoff a large amount (because fish are like kids, if it's tasty, they will eat large amounts, even if they aren't supposed to), and get tummy problems. Alternative, you don't feed enough protein, and your meat-eaters don't get enough nutrition, and don't grow well.

I would also suggest that species from the same genus, e.g Leporacanthicus (joselimai, triactis & L007) and Hemiancistrus (L128 & L200) should not be kept in the same tank once they start to become sexually mature - particularly if there are no same species "partners" in the tank - as you may end up with hybrids offspring.

Leporacanthicus can also be quite territorial and aggressive, so it's one to watch. I had to take one out of my tank to "recover", after it got all roughed up by one of the others [I assume, as I didn't see what happened, just saw the fish all white like it had been chewed by another]. It is back in the main tank now, but it illustrates what can happen if you keep aggressive fish together.

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Mats

Re: How many,are to many?

Posted: 12 Sep 2011, 18:53
by Carter77
That's been really helpful, thanks
The golden nugget and sultan seem to be the only ones to be shy to eat.
Can you really get hybrids offspring?

Re: How many,are to many?

Posted: 12 Sep 2011, 19:37
by MatsP
Yes, there are several documented cases of hybrid offspring in plecos. Hypancistrus is the most commmon cross-bred species (usually by accident, but there have been some direct breeding attempts to see "what happens").

I'm not talking about being shy to eat (although that can also be a problem, of course), but the fact that some will eat a lot of meat, when that's not a suitable diet.

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Mats