PlanetCatfish.com

Hello Everybody!

Impulse purchase... which should never be done but I'm sure many of us are guilty of it.

(S)he was sold to me as a "Florida Pleco" with promises of never getting over 6 inches. I was quite doubting everything the nice boy was telling me, but bought it anyways. I can take more pictures if you need me too... the one of his/her belly is extremly accurate of his true colouring as the other two make him out to be more brown then grey.

It is currently 3 1/2 inches long, and quite friendly and tame. Thank you anybody who can help me ID him... I would like to hope it's not just a common pleco, but I'm not holding my breath.





He's not deformed... he was just wiggling

Looks like a common to me... But then, are catfish ever common??

Defintely a common pleco. They are bred in Florida by the thousands, hence the name you bought it under.

Fish Demon wrote:Defintely a common pleco. They are bred in Florida by the thousands, hence the name you bought it under.

Make that MILLIONS!

Though exact species ID can be about impossible w/ these farmed fish, it'll grow up to be something like

Pterygoplichthys pardalis

or

Pterygoplichthys ambrosettii

...and FAR larger than the most ignorantly (or insidiously) quoted 6"!

Even now that you can see the grey/white... Is he still going to kill my tank in a couple months?

If by "kill" you mean "outgrow", then yes.

He is going to get on average about 16" long, though we have one at work that is literally pushing 18". A 120 gallon tank is the absolute minimum size I'd keep a common pleco in permanently.