Ancistrus Dolichopterus L183

[Syno Rey]

In getting a pair of Ancistrus Dolichopterus L183 this week and will like to know if they are easy or hard to keep. Do they really need black water to do best and reproduce and if so, what is the best way to get black water parameters. And what size tank is best for a pair ?

[MatsP]

For keeping, they need relatively soft water until they are acclimatised, from my own short experience with these. I don't know how to breed them, but I certainly would expect that they need soft water.

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Mats

[Barbie]

These are actually the hardest to raise Ancistrus I've worked with to date. Yes, in a nutshell, plan on very soft acidic water for viable spawns. Warm water will also help.

Barbie

[Syno Rey]

what should be the best parameters ? and whats the best food to feed them ?

[RickE]

Mine are thriving in my discus tank - 84-85F, pH 6-6.5 and I use mostly RO water so it's soft, the TDS is usually below 100.

They seem to eat a bit of everything: the usual frozen foods, prawn, beefheart some flake food if any reaches them. Importantly, they also need a good supply of green stuff.

Unfortunately I seem to have 3 males

[apistomaster]

Few fish from the Rio Negro are able to thrive and breed unless they are kept in extremely warm, soft water with a pH >6.0.
I can't think of any which are considered easy to breed and I can count many dozens which are among the most challenging of SA tropical fish. The pH throughout most of the drainage is rarely more than 4.5 and often only 3.5(about the same as household vinegar and lemon juice) and have no hardness if a colormetric hardness test methods are used. Heckel Discus are a good example. There are still only a handful of well documented cases of a successful captive breeding of Heckel Discus and many have been trying for about the past 5 decades.
Lots of popular species from the Rio Negro are wild caught imports like Cardinal Tetras, Rummy nose Tetras and dozens of others. Some of the Corydoras have a better success record but they are exceptions to the rule and are among the more difficult to breed Corydoras. Some Rio Negro Dwarf Cichlids can be bred but all are considered among the most difficult species. Just as Barbie said about Ancistrus L183, tough nuts to crack.

Learning how to maintain a black water aquarium within normal natural limits is much more difficult than aquariums for fish which may be kept or bred at a pH of 6.0. Each whole pH number is 10 times as acid or alkaline as the next whole unit on either side. It is just like the Richter Scale method of rating earthquakes.