Need information: Synodinitis arbiliniata

[Jester946]

Just picked this guy up from my AWSOME LFS....

And can't find any information on him. This is obviously my first post, and most of the time get good info here with google, but I am stumped, as is google, on this breed of syno...

What can you tell me?

He is black, with white vertical stripes on his body. If you'd like, I can get a picture shortly. Just mainly wondering how big he will get...I was told he is very rare.

[Birger]

There is no syno with that particular spelling...there is an

Synodontis albolineata

Can we see a picture of your fish, it would help to ID it correctly without it turning into a guessing game.


Birger

[Birger]

Does it look similar to this

Synodontis sp_hybrid(9)

Birger

[MatsP]

That isn't a valid name. Is it perhaps

Synodontis albolineata

? We don't have much information on that fish, since it's not a fish commonly found in the trade - which also means that I could well be wrong. Lothar Seeger's "The Catfishes of Africa" says that it has only been imported once, and that was to the USA. Of course, a book is only accurate about these sort of things when the book is actually still being worked on, once it's been printed, information goes out of print. However, the picture in the book (which is also in our database) doesn't show a fish with vertical bands.

Any chance you could give us a photo of the fish?

[Birger obviously thinks the same thing, but wrote a bit less...]

--
Mats

[Jester946]

I went searching through my rock, and found him. Of course, my cam was just out of reach. I finally got my cam, and went to a snap a pic one handed, and it came out terrible.

After some short research, he is definitely a hybrid synodontis, and I even found a thread of someone asking others if they have ever heard of this guy.

Zebra in colour, and I will continue to wait to take a quality picture of him.


thread I found....

http://www.fishlore.com/fishforum/catfi ... tfish.html

[Jester946]

Another google linked post...

Found this guy selling them, of course no information attached...

http://www.facebook.com/catfishcharlies ... 8578823840

[Jester946]

Sorry, trying my best here.

[Jester946]

better pic with the flash (which I HATE using on the tank)

[Jools]

Does it look similar to this

Synodontis sp_hybrid(9)

I think Birger's got it spot on.

Jools

[Jester946]

Thank you guys for the terrific information.

Noob question incoming....

How do I feed this guy? He's stays hiding in my rocks, and I have no clue how to feed him. I know he will eat damn near anything, and my other cichlids come right to my feeding point when I open the lid.

I do have a batch of shell dwellers under where I feed, so they mostly clean up that side quickly...

[Birger]

Most synos will after awhile figure out the food situation and become active when food is involved...another way is especially for the first few weeks add some food after lights out waiting at least 1/2 hour for the others to settle down first.

Birger

[Jester946]

Most synos will after awhile figure out the food situation and become active when food is involved...another way is especially for the first few weeks add some food after lights out waiting at least 1/2 hour for the others to settle down first.

Birger

I will do just that.

I am feeding baby/adult brine, flora veggie flakes finely ground up, and new life spectrum cichlid pellets...

which of these should I leave out for him?

[Birger]

Any would do, I would throw a few pellets into the same place for the first bit, it will condition to this.

They also will probably eat any veggie such as what you see people usually feeding to some plecos, zuchini, green beans etc.

Birger

[Birger]

Here is another thread from earlier today, looks larger but I think yours will be similar.

http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/view ... 15#p261687

Birger

[Jester946]

Here is another thread from earlier today, looks larger but I think yours will be similar.

http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/view ... 15#p261687

Birger

Yea, just read that thread.

After some research, I have a feeling my fish came from here, and of course, everyone has their own name for whatever fish they artificially created.

http://www.segrestfarms.com/index.cfm?f ... eatus.html

[Richard B]

Maybe they came from there? A lot of hybrids come from Eastern Europe.

Albolineata is a genuine, ultra rare species, known only from the holotype (seegers mentions it PROBABLY has been imported to the US once & in my book, probably isn't definite!). The producers of hybrids often use genuine names of rare fish to try & sell their fish - velifer, ornatipinnis, pardalis, granulosa & koensis have all been frequently used when trying to pass off hybrids.

[MatsP]

Segrest farm is a large importer as well as breeder of fish, so it's entirely possible that the fish they have come from a breeder in, say, Czech republic.

--
Mats

[jippo]

Segrest farm is a large importer as well as breeder of fish, so it's entirely possible that the fish they have come from a breeder in, say, Czech republic.

--
Mats

There has been same fishes here at Finland too, came from Sweden but origin is Czech republic. And they came as Synodontis albolineata as well.

[Jester946]

Did some plant propagation today, and moved my rocks around. This guy was so "Stuck" to my big rock, that I about pulled it out with him attached.

After I placed everything back, he scurried to a corner, so I took this chance to do two things: drop some pellets there for him.

[Jester946]

After some more reading, it looks like I am doing this all wrong with only one in my 55 gallon tang tank?

How many will make him feel comfy, 3-4? Pretty sure my LFS only have 1 other of his hybrid, though I know they have another type of synodontis, I am not sure what breed (maybe a different hybrid?) is it. Will they get along fine?

[Richard B]

2 is the worst number to have. It'll do ok as a single but 3 or more would also work. If mixing species / hybrid types you'll need at least 3 separate 'types'.

This doesn't apply to nigiri entries or contrata where any number but more the merrier will work

[Jester946]

Thank you for the information Richard.

So my larger tank is fairly new. All of my water parameters are great, and have been stable.

I've had a recent diatom outbreak, and its on my life plants.

Will my synodontis eat this stuff? I have noticed he's been hanging out on my live plants, which is cool, he hasn't damaged any leaves..I'm guessing he's eating this stuff, or no?

[Richard B]

Likely it will get eaten as synos eat pretty much anything & can be quite greedy

[Jester946]

Hey Richard, at bit of an update.

I broke down my cichlid tank; I wasn't happy with the stock, and with the turn out. The diatoms never let up either.

I broke it down, sold the fish, and held onto one: my hybrid syno. He did just fine in my QT tank with some shrimp and german blue rams...

I finally set the tank back up, and moved him into it this morning. By the way; I haven't seen him, at all, in the mean time. Except when I "dig deep" (break a tank down...) do I find him. I have no idea if he's eating, well, he must be, he's still alive. I never did pickup another couple syno for three total, I don't want them to breed, at all.

Here's a pic of the tank he went into...

[o2bad455]

Sqeakers are rare where I am right now, but after a year of searching we finally found this little guy (about 1-inch) at our LFS. We only got one so far, but they have (or at least had) a couple more so we're thinking about going back for those too to give him some company. But now we're wondering whether or not they're hybrids.

Although the tank at our LFS was labeled Synodontis ARBILineatus (similar to this thread, hence the revival), I didn't notice the apparent misspelling of the name until after we brought this one home and introduced it to the tank (that is, I'd misread it as S. albolineatus at the LFS). I haven't been able to get any better pics than the 2nd attached pic since there are too many good places for it to hide in our 90-gal.

He looks to me like many online pics of Synodontis albolineatus with a short somewhat lateral wavy white line plus vertical lines, but not much like the original S. albolineatus (similar to S. tessmanni) with just a long straight lateral white line (and no vertical lines). But he looks closer to the Cat-elog pics of S. ornatipinnis, which although a beautiful fish, grows to the enormous size of over 15 inches! Yikes! (say the Guppies).

In a previous life, I raised Mbuna in a 55-gal with with a few rift lake Sqeakers that I'd picked up as babies. Those grew to about 8-9 inches which was okay with the cichlids. Although those Squeakers never did breed, the Mbuna sure did! But even that size Squeaker would be a bit much for the Guppies in our current 90-gal tank. So I'd picked this up because I believed he'd be limited to about 4.5 inches (per what I'd read for S. albolineatus). Was I mistaken as to species, and therefore possibly as to maximum size?

Or can anyone tell me if this is more likely a true S. albolineatus, another true species, or a hybrid? If it's a hybrid, S. sp_hybrid(9)? I haven't seen him swim upside down at all yet, but he's obviously still young so that could change.

[bekateen]

Hi o2bad455,

Welcome to Planetcatfish! As for your syno, better photos would confirm, but I suspect you have the hybrid,

Synodontis sp_hybrid(9)

.

Cheers, Eric