any one from the UK bought from here

PsYcHoTiC_MaDmAn · Post by **PsYcHoTiC_MaDmAn** » 16 Oct 2006, 14:14

http://www.trimar.co.uk/

looking for some plec (type) catfish to go in with my Geophagus and tetras.

currently i have a whiptail, but would like another couple of catfish.

unfortuneatly with the geos being substrate sifters that rules out corys, as the 2 compete for the same area of the tank, and a 6" cichlid is most likly to win.

so i'm looking for a nice catfish (or 2) to clean up the tank a bit. the one i was looking at on the site was "LDA 31 PEACH SPOT PANAQUE" (excusethe capitals, i did a copy n paste) and i have a nice peace of bogwood in there available to the panque.

any reviews of this shop please, (i'm also likly to pick up some of those petricola for my mbuna tank)

MatsP · Post by **MatsP** » 16 Oct 2006, 14:23

What kind of earth-eaters are they? I have Satanoperca leucostictus with my C. sterbai in a fairly big tank, and they don't bother each other much...

LDA31 = . Probably not the best choice for "cleaning up the tank a bit" - more of "dirtying the tank with sawdust" I should think - I haven't kept this particular species, but if is anything to go by [and I have read other reports to that extent], they are messy.

I went to Cornwall on holiday a while back, and on one day we went to the Tri-mar shop. I was quite impressed with the stock, they have a lot of fish... Some of them where quite small tho', so check with them what size (in centimeters or inches rather than S, M, L, XL etc) before you think "That's a great price".

I haven't bought from them, but there's been other posts by people who have...

--
Mats

PsYcHoTiC_MaDmAn · Post by **PsYcHoTiC_MaDmAn** » 16 Oct 2006, 22:18

i got these http://www.cichlid-forum.com/profiles/s ... php?id=465

i looked up those satanoperca of yours, theyre given the same aggresion rating as my geos. except yours grow to 10" whereas mine should only hit 6".

any of those particular catfish you'd recomend. as i got the trigon 190 i cant really fit any fish over 6" maybey 8".

the only thing is its my parents tank (my fish however) and my mum wants me to get a black fish (and it looks like thats only going to be a catfish)

other tank mates are a single flying fox, and probly 15 colombian tetras.

got to pick up another couple of heaters though. managed to shatter 1 in my Mbuna tank, and now i have no spares to put in a quarantine tank.

as for the size thing, the geos are still small so starting off with small fish means i'll get the most for my money

BTW whats wrong with the word C!chlids. noticed it had ** them off.

grokefish · Post by **grokefish** » 17 Oct 2006, 10:52

I've bought fish from tri-mar, some south american bumblebee catfish, they delivered them to my house, although I actually bought them in the shop (I was on holiday too I was living in swansea at the time) and they arrived safe and well with the only problem being there were five south american bumblebees and one nasty asian, a very different fish indead, but good service, they delivered them almost to the exact time they said.
Personally I havew never had any problems with earth eaters and cory's except for a bit of 'shooing away' which didn't seem to bother the cory's. What part of wales are you?

MatsP · Post by **MatsP** » 17 Oct 2006, 12:48

The "thing" about Cichlid is a little joke based on the fact that some of the cichlid societies tend to view anything that isn't a cichlid as an inferior fish, and particularly that all catfish are viewed as "scavengers" and that they are only really there to clean up after the "proper fish". Many cichlid sites refuse to discuss any fish that isn't a cichlid, etc, etc. So Jools decided that he could "hide" cichlid as a name.

I've edited your post so that the link isn't clobbered by this feature of the site.

Not sure what catfish to recommend as such - depends on what you like... Corys are fine - if your tank is on the warm-side, you'd probably want something like C. sterbai. They are good "cleaning crew" and look nice, often visible, etc, etc.

Can't think of a black catfish that suits your criteria, so not sure what to suggest there...

There's hundreds of plecos available, some are more omnivore than the panaque and stay small: is a genus that has many nice omnivorous, 4-6" sized and relatively colourfull. In my experience they are also quite outgoing and active.

But there's 2500 different species of catfish (around 1700 in the Cat-eLog), so there should be plenty for you to choose from.

--
Mats

synoguy · Post by **synoguy** » 17 Oct 2006, 17:29

I have dealt with tri-mar several times and bought many fish from them. They have always treated me well and the fish from there have been good... funny you should mention those petricola, I picked up 3 last week and they are currently settling into their new home, they are small but they are perfect lil fish, very active too.

Panaques are definatly a sawdust maker, but i have a fairly young Royal in one of my tanks, and he does an outstanding job of keeping the glass clean, when i got him the back glass had a fair bit of brown algae, 2 days later it was gone. But hes definatly a bit of a sawdust machine.

Also i have some geophagus brasiliensis and some g. surinames in with some cories and theres been absolutly no trouble so far.

Goodluck!

PsYcHoTiC_MaDmAn · Post by **PsYcHoTiC_MaDmAn** » 17 Oct 2006, 23:41

well i think i'll go for a trio of C sterbai as well as the LDA 31. basicly because i like the look of them. as for the sawdust, i'll just syphon that out.

think i'll also order 6 petricola for my mbuna tank, i'm plannng to consolodate all my mbuna tanks into 1 big 1 (6by2by2) and convert the 4foot into a tropheus tank, and keep my hybrid syno in there.

as for what part of wales, west coast, near lampeter. not yet found a great LFS. i use the 1 right local for basic stuff like conditioners, otherwise i go down to maidenhead aquatics in ponterddulias (think thats how its spelt)

grokefish · Post by **grokefish** » 18 Oct 2006, 10:23

Creamstone aquatics is worth a trip, have you been to that mad shop in ammanford it's worth going there for a laugh, sometimes he has some oddballs there, Mill aquatics in swansea is deffinately worth a look it's not much further than pontardulais (by the big tescos as you enter swansea) and they often have some really good catfish.

PsYcHoTiC_MaDmAn · Post by **PsYcHoTiC_MaDmAn** » 18 Oct 2006, 14:01

tried ammonford saturday. felt the tanks needed cleaning, plus the betta setup annoyed me. i know they live in puddles in the wild, but 6cm cube is not big enough for any fish, let alone a 1.5" betta.

had a look in the mill aquatics last month sometime, was tidy, but nothing jumped out at me.

mind you my yellow lab juvis look better than the yellow labs beeing sold in maidenhead aquatics & mill aquatics.

wheres the creamstone aquatics shop.

grokefish · Post by **grokefish** » 28 Oct 2006, 01:31

Haverford west.
That shop in amanford is madness

any one from the UK bought from here

any one from the UK bought from here

Tri-Mar