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Yes I am about to turn 68, and no, I do not plan on leaving the hobby quite yet. When the heater fried my breeders I had 20 fish with msjinkzd and another 26 in my other tanks. The largest of these are getting pretty close to spawning size.

If this in any help. I have worked with 236, zebras and 173 and here is what I can tell you. Of the three fish the 236 begin spawning the soonest. I usually think 3 or more years to get a decent colony of 173 or zebras to the point of being a spawning group from hatching out. The 236 appear to cut a 1/3 off this time.

I can also tell you that a person I trust on wild fish has opined recently in a conversation that zebras and 173 are species (zebras are described) but he felt what we consider as 236 to be hybrids. I cannot say if he is correct in this or not. I leave this to people more expert than I am.

I can also tell you that there apparently is a breeder or two working with 236 to create what are best called a "super white" variation. This is the same sort of line breeding project that produces the sorts of betta, guppy, angel, discus and bn varieties we see, among others. To me this gives further support to my belief that 236 reach maturity faster. If one accepts that 3 years is about how long it takes for zebras or 173 to be spawnable, then to get through several generations into fixing a trait, one would be looking at about 10 years or a bit more. On the other hand a fish that can be spawned in two years would cut that time down to about 6 years or so as in the 236. Just this man's opinion as always.

Finally, I am far from the only one offering these fish in the USA let alone having spawned them.

Here are a couple of my typically poor pics I shot in the 236 tank yesterday: Note the tube out ^. This one is close to ready
Finally, I am only looking to keep 10 of my 26 at best, the rest are for sale. I work with msjinkzd as she can ship cheaper than I can. I also dislike shipping as well and its worth giving here a cut to avoid having to do so. However, I am now overloaded with fish for sale and have resumed shipping.

Ltygress wrote:msjinkzd is about to run dry on these. She was selling them for a much older man (in his late 60's) on consignment. But he had a problem with the heater in the adult breeder tank, and his breeder plecos died. He is trying to grow some out now to get started again, but let's face facts....

I'm not trying to be insulting, but this guy is already in his late 60's. These plecos will have to grow up and start breeding for him (which could easily take years) before he passes away from old age.

TwoTankAmin wrote:Yes I am about to turn 68, and no, I do not plan on leaving the hobby quite yet.

Say it ain't so! I just got into this hobby (for the second time in my life) 3-4 years ago, and I'm already 53 years old... What was I thinking?!? If 60 is the new 80, I guess I might as well stop planning any breeding projects and trade away all my tanks and fish. ... Wait, no - it's not going to happen.

While I can't agree more that the stability of the hobby grows with the number of people actively breeding each species or L number, so the more the merrier, this post is a little insulting to its target, even if some truth exists in the risks to the hobby. I.e., you can't say, "I'm not trying to be insulting," and then in the next breath lament the demise of someone who isn't demised yet. LOL.

TTA, I think you handled this with grace. Good for you.

Cheers, Eric

I will be 52 next month. But even if I was going to turn 82 I am going to live my life as if I am going to be here until 92. A month ago a guy died at 37 of natural causes. My grandmother will be 95 this year. Ltygress you might not be around in 3 years to buy any of the babies. Tomorrow is promised to no one. But ignorance makes people believe otherwise.

How many years are in between 60 and death in your head? I'm 18 so I can't talk from personal experience but lets look at the facts...

The average lifespan for an American male (as of 2012) is 78.74 and it only ever goes up because of health care advancements regularly occurring so two tank at the age of 68 according to my calculations has at least a decade left (many many variables here like car accidents getting struck by lightning etc) Two tank has at least a decade left (Yay twotank!)

Secondly as he has already had success breeding them (and breeding many more members of the Hypancistrus genus) a statistically safe assumption would be that he does not need to perform the trial and error that takes the majority of time in spawning fish as he already has "perfected" the craft to some extent.

Thirdly I don't know why you would assume he would have his entire population in one tank (when you factor in how many fish breeders use separate tanks to rear or have another population just in case I believe you should have been able to analyze that data and see that it would be statistically un-probable that he would keep his entire stock in a single tank).

Fourthly and most importantly I'm assuming you are far from that age if you think its so close to death but I feel like you are ignoring one more statistic and that stat is how probable it is you will die first? most ages between 12-30 should have a higher chance of meeting an untimely end because they tend to be more reckless since they lack the experience some one who has lived over the 50 mark would have acquired. Perhaps you should consider the statistics of when you'll meet your end and see if that gives you enough time to acquire, breed and sell enough fish to benefit the species or if you should pass them up and let them got to more experienced hands.

If I had one question for you it would be what kind of plecos are you keeping that take a decade to spawn and grow to a reasonable size?

I'm not trying to be offensive or anything but your "facts" seem to consider very few variables and you have almost completely ignored statistics (I can think of few things with a more factual nature then statistics).

As TwoTankAdmins's signature reads:

"Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts."-Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Maybe you might meet someone with L236 at the 2016 (Oct) CatCon?
http://catfishcon.com/

I had the pleasure of meeting TTA there in 2014 (sorry to hear about your heater failure).

I will be there and if I still have stock available, I will be bringing 236s plus zebras, 450s and who knows what else. The 173bs seem to be spawning again and I am pulling fry. Maybe the adult 173s on loan will spawn in time as well. Hopefully, I will not have passed on from old age by then. If I have, what floor is reserved for the walking dead......

@Ltygress, putting aside the positive comments of @Linus_Cello and @TwoTankAmin, don't misconstrue the negative responses in this thread (e.g., mine). I suspect that nobody here is consciously trying to be a "hater" (as people say nowadays on social media) towards you or your post. Rather, speaking for myself, I can say that your original post came across as rather panicked (especially with the capitalized words in the last sentence) and at the same time an affront to people who are of (or nearly of) older years (60 or older).

I appreciate your concern for fish sources, but perhaps next time you want to express such a sentiment, you might also express a similar level of appreciation and concern for the people involved.

Cheers, and good health to you,
Eric

P.S.,

TwoTankAmin wrote:If I have, what floor is reserved for the walking dead......

TTA, I don't know what floor you'll stay on, but you'll probably need to put your car in underground parking. LOL

(True story: In my town there is a hospital beside a cemetery; the hospital has an underground parking lot and the entrance is near the cemetery. As you drive by on the street, there is a sign, with an arrow that seems to point towards the cemetery, with the words, "Underground parking." An unfortunate coincidence. )

You can contact Eric Bodrock through his email at sales@alloddballaquatics.com or you can try to look him up on aquabid.com where I believe he is Alloddballaquatics, but not sure if that last one is accurate.

By way of an update. Yesterday I had a trapping in this tank. Today it had ended. I do not believe it resulted in eggs. However, there sure is what looks like a fat fm not to far from the cave. It is spawning season here for some reason, so I am hopeful.

Good luck with them!

This has been a most interesting thread. I have read it about 9 times and found highs on people and one low.
I just restarded my hobby again, and I am 52. Never left my soul for sure, and would always keep tabs on hobbist and met quite a few characters and good friends. Always try to help the begginers as they might turn into masters.
Good luck to everyone, and hopefully I can meet some of you at he catcon.
Mig

PC thread on CatCon2016:
http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/view ... =2&t=42743

I just wanted to update on the 236. I have a dad on eggs . This is my first spawn from the parents who were boiled to death by a faulty heater. I finally selected the 10 largest for my self and the rest have been moved elsewhere. The spawn is not large, maybe 15 eggs or so. What is really unusual is this tank is the top one of two 33 longs. If I could drop a plum bob through the bottom glass in then into the tank below, it would hit a pile of eggs recently laid in a L173b cave. The two caves are almost perfectly aligned.

So Eric got his fry via Haakon (F1) from Budrovcan. Eric spawned these and old some of his fry (F2) to me. Mine spawned and then were killed and now their offspring (F3) have spawned what should be F4 in the line, so to speak. That is a whole lot of F'n going on here.

Congrats TTA... And before you hit 70

TTA you handled that well to the "younger guy" respect goes a long way.... whatever happened to respect your elders?

Congratulations on the spawn TTA.

What water temp do you keep the L236 and H. zebra at? I am keeping my H. zebra at 86F and they are close to spawning size. I want to make sure I have the right conditions for spawning.

Andy

Andy I kept mine at 86 and did a 30% or more cold water change and it induces spawning for me, not sure about TTA's tank parameters
very hard to find L173 and 238 here in the UK, I've a tank waiting and no one can get me any lol

I will vary the temps depending on the tank and what is going on in it. For general growout and non-simulation of dry and rainy seasons, I then like to have tanks in the low 80sF (80-82). Sometimes they will drift higher. I sometimes let growout tanks get a bit cooler (78/79F). Basically, if the fish come from the Xingu, they can take it warm. I have had tanks up to 90F by the end of a dry season. I am very lucky to have my own well water which seems to be ideal for non-hard water fish. My pH in 2001 was 7.3 and today it is 7.0+. I measured GH and KH in those days at 6 and 5 dg. I have worked with TDS now for the past 5+ years and my current tap is about 83 ppm. If we get a lot of rain over a week or two I have seen the TDS drop into the 50 ppm range.

For my part I do not consider myself an expert at anything involving fish. I have been smart about a few things like good water quality and decent diet but I really think I am just very lucky in having the water source that I do. Fish just seem to spawn in my tanks in spite of me, not because of me.

What I find more interesting in all of this are the differences when comparing the ultimate size, the time from birth to spawning and the readiness to spawn repeatedly between zebras, 173 and 236.

Try Nabobmob1 on here he has L236 plecos for sale

I cursed myself with the last post.Yeaterday I went to clean both tanks in question and the 173b dad was out of the cave and the eggs were gone. The 236 eggs are fine, however. Unless I just recursed myself by posting that

Good luck! Hope you get every success with hatching and raising of the fry:)

Just a quick update. I lost the spawn I reported above. But undaunted the fish went ahead an spawned again. This time I moved the spawn into a 20 gal. to grow out. As is my custom I move the entire cave with the dad and almost free swimming fry out of the breeder tank when I do this. The weekend before last I returned the dad and the cave to the same spot in the breeding cave.

I just got back from doing a late night feeding in the fish space and I can report that he, or another male, is on a new batch of eggs in the same cave.

Wonderful news! (not about the brood you lost, but I imagine that is attributable to your other thread on the downsides of fishkeeping).

Cheers, Eric