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Who owns a really large pl*c and could you show us please with supporting photographic evidence.....no guesses please!!

Any particular variety? [As there are about 600 different species in the Loricaridae family, and almost all that even have a common name will be called something Pleco].

I don't own any big ones, but my local shop has some P. Pardalis that are well over 10", which isn't anywhere near their max size, but they are amongst the biggest ones I've seen myself.

--
Mats

I've seen specimen nearing 2 feet, but that was in the wild.
biggest Plec I know personally is a 20+ year old gibby in a tank of a friend; that beast is 43cm TL (measured length!)

seen a gibby at a show that was at least 45 cm total length and on that amazon abyss prog a couple of months back there was a panaque that was huge!!!

Well thats huge 45 cm, but i'd rather see pictures of pl*s that are huge.

This is fair sized. Photos property and courtesy of zx12, webmaster of placofanatics.com
-Shane

Here is a 50cm P.Pardalis

Nice one, Shane; looks like a Panaque!

is it a blue eye, or a close relative?

LDA 65. What baffles me is that this is the largest and most common Panaque in Amazonas and yet remains undescribed.
-Shane

man thats a HUGE fish.

anymore?

LDA 65. What baffles me is that this is the largest and most common Panaque in Amazonas and yet remains undescribed.
-Shane

This is what makes me wonder too in general.Another pleco is L 25.How come these have not yet been described? Maybe this should be one topic in taxonomy section.

On both those fish, they are very much deep water fish and so I presume this, and the plethora of undescribed fish in the amazon, explains their only recent move into the public eye?

Jools

I like it, a pretty fish.

a bit huge for the ordinary tank, but I'll take a safe bet they taste terrific on the ol' BBQ.

You might just need a Louisville Slugger to get to the edible bits, though; a simple knife and fork won't crack that armour

90 cm is big enough? ;)

Acanthicus hystrix

I was wondering when someone would bring up these, they're about the biggest Pleco's around, next to Megalancistrus I think.

correct me if I'm wrong


Acanthicus hystrix
This one's quite larger than 60 cm, perhaps the info in the catelog should be updated?

For the specialists; what is -officially/scientific described- BIGGEST Pleco around?

It's sucker appears to be the same size as the Ray in the tank. Is the Ray food or tankmate? I also wonder how old are these larger specimens? I love the black and white photo in the catelog!

sidguppy wrote:Acanthicus hystrix
I was wondering when someone would bring up these, correct me if I'm wrong

LOL, Sidguppy, I was on my way to grab that link when I ran into your post. I too am surprised it took so long to turn up. One of my favorite fish photos.

troi

You're wrong Sid(yes, it can happen!
This is an Acanthicus adonis, not a hystix

Rense wrote: This is an Acanthicus adonis, not a hystix

What is the distinction, based on what we can see in this pic? Doesn't adonis reach "max" around 24 inches, accepting that size limits are guesses and not "writ in stone"?

troi

No Adonis are not uncommon at all as fully grown adults to be around 90cm. Biggest Pleco I ever saw was many years ago in a LFS here and to this day I have no idea what it was. Looked like a giant L114 with smaller spots but was proberbly 90cm +. Never seen or heard of one like that since proberbly a mutant gibby or something.

taksan wrote:No Adonis are not uncommon at all as fully grown adults to be around 90cm.

Oh, dear. Certainly not in captivity?

Guess I should move forward in finding a space and making a pond. Then I could get a Mother Of Snails as well, i guess.

troi

troi wrote:Certainly not in captivity?

they aparently do reach sizes like that in captivity.

Everyone is missing the point of this post..What i want is pictures of everyones large pl*c... Can we have more pics please

This is an Acanthicus adonis, not a hystix

Acanthicus adonis has very conspicious white spots, whereas A hystix is a black-grey monster.

where are the white spots??
I'll stick to hystix!

sidguppy wrote:

This is an Acanthicus adonis, not a hystix

Acanthicus adonis has very conspicious white spots, whereas A hystix is a black-grey monster.

where are the white spots??
I'll stick to hystix!

This is a adonis .... they only have the white spots as juveniles or sub adults

taksan wrote:This is a adonis .... they only have the white spots as juveniles or sub adults

Yes, but how then do you tell adult A. hystrix and A. adonis apart if they both are black?

Jools

Jools wrote:

taksan wrote:This is a adonis .... they only have the white spots as juveniles or sub adults

Yes, but how then do you tell adult A. hystrix and A. adonis apart if they both are black?

Jools

Easy you put them both in the same tank and the next morning you fish out the dead hystrix

Very funny, that doesn't answer the question however. How do you ascertain the difference that you state above?

Jools

What I do know that the white dots fade when they become subadult/adult.

I'm not sure how to tell the difference between adult hystix and adult adonis, but the site where this picture came from said it was an adonis, so that's why I think it's adonis ;)

@sid: look them up in the cat-eLog, there are also pictures of subadults and there spots are almost completely gone...

@sid: look them up in the cat-eLog, there are also pictures of subadults and there spots are almost completely gone

don't insult me by implying that I did NOT check the catelog immedeately after I found out about this topic and decided to reply

I still stand by A hystix UNTIL someone gives me hard proof that the entirely unspotted black monster is in fact A adonis.

the site where this picture came from said it was an adonis, so that's why I think it's adonis

given the confusion on Loricariid names, the many mistakes by retailers when it comes to label their fish correctly, the amount of sheer gibberish and idiocy on the net and the average intelligence-level of my fellow bi-peds on this planet putting down stuff on internet; that is a VERY dangerous aasumption to make, Rense!!

just because "some site said it was".......
woooooooooo dangerous.

I'll wait for the dedicated Loricariid Honcho's to jump in, just like Jools; and wait for the verdict