Lima is very shy

[teddyman5]

Got a 6" Lima in a large tank with some severum, siamese arrow sharks and a couple of 10" synos and some smaller bits and pieces. No aggression in the tank at all.
The Lima I have had for a few weeks but he just stays in a pot and never comes out ( except of course maybe at night ). If I got another one or two do you think they would come out as agroup and be less shy?
Tank size is not an issue.

Anybody got any experience?

Thanks a lot

[Bas Pels]

Lima are rather shy - even in the best of times

They are also very quiet - that is, they dislike acively swimming fish. I can well imagine your tank is not quiet enough

lastly, they like to be among themselves. Assuming your tank is quiet enough, adding a few more would reduce shyness a lot

[Viktor Jarikov]

i've observed both: overcoming shyness with time on their own and the help of a group

my first lima (supposedly Sorubim lima - ID-ing this species is not without its controversies) had been hiding for the first 3-4 months before slowly starting to be proactive at feedings - during those initial months, I had to always invent ways to throw food in front of him so he does not starve to death in my community tank and even then he would miss perhaps half the time.

[Back]

As mentioned before and also my experience.

Sorubims thrive much better when being in groups.
They don't really enjoy tankmates but can go well with calmer species of Plecos
Mine (S elongatus) have been even more relaxed when joined by schools of tetras.
The idea is that they might use the tetras as "warning sign" fish.
Possible drawback is that those alarm messengers turns into food during night.
However elongatus seems to leave smaller fish more at peace (I have no confirmed recording of mine eating tetras) while lima most certainly would and will wipe them out one after the other.

Elongatus and lima are probably the two most "common" Sorubims in the trade. They are hard to tell apart but it's indeed possible from a good photo.

Hope your Sorubim comes to ease in your tank.

[GW_NL]

I agree with the other posters.

I had a group of 7 lima's (20-25 cm) which weren't shy at all. They really seemed to like the company and where rarely on their own in the tank.

In the tank where some pleco's and a group of Geophagus.

I strongly suggest keeping them in a group of at least 5 specimens. But then off course you'll need quite a fishtank....

[apistomaster]

A group of S.lima will be much more interesting to watch than a one or two nervous and shy specimens as everyone has already pointed out. You get more comfortable fish which are going to exhibit more interesting activities when you keep 5 or more. They are primarily nocturnal but a group can be conditioned to be more active during the day, especially if you have suitable tank mates like some Geophagus species similar to the Geophagus cf. surinamensis type. Most of these get fairly large. Another species which would make an enjoyable group of tank mates would be Guianacara geayi or rarer Guinacara spp which all run smaller than true Geophagus but retain very similar behaviors. If you want some other fish which use the upper 1/3 of the water column, Mesonauta spp are nice. Dwarf Pike Cichlids are another nice group of species to consider as tank mates as they won't bother fish they can not swallow. They eat other Cichlid fry in the wild; especially focusing on those of the Apistogramma spp.
These are all medium sized, rarely more than 6 inches, Cichlids which get large enough without becoming too large. By choosing these smaller large Cichlids you have more room for some variety. None will bother you S. lima catfish.