Looking For Synodontis njassae

[Distichodus]

I've got a Malawi species tank, and I'd love to add a few Synodontis njassae. Unfortunately I cannot find a single US source. Any ideas?

[MatsP]

Generally not the easiest of species to get hold of.

I have no personal experience with them, but Silurus has suggested them as a place to get other stuff:
http://www.rehobothaquatics.com/index2.html (The species is not listed in the "in stock" list, but use the contact page to enquire).

Again, I have no personal contact with these peopel (I've driven past New Braunfels several times, but I wasn't aware of them being there at the time):
http://www.ohiexchange.com/armke/index.html
[The web-site is a bit "ancient", but I believe the company is still active - Dave Rinaldo, can you confirm?]

Also be wary of hybrid species where one parent is Njassae. Any fish that isn't clearly indicated as "wild caught" (and thus fairly expensive) is likely to be a captive bred mix of two species - not what you want.

Edit: An indication as to how hard these are to find is that the first hit when searching for "Synodontis njassae for sale" in google, the first hit is this thread!

--
Mats

[Marc van Arc]

Alas no good for Distichodus, but perhaps useful for Western-Europeans:

Zoo Zajac in Duisburg, Germany had 5 or 6 genuine wild caught njassae last week. They were 42 euros each.

[MatsP]

Alas no good for Distichodus, but perhaps useful for Western-Europeans:

Zoo Zajac in Duisburg, Germany had 5 or 6 genuine wild caught njassae last week. They were 42 euros each.

Assuming those weren't tiny ones, I would think that's a pretty good price (it's a decent price even if they are tiny as far as I understand, but bigger specimens certainly makes it a better price!).

--
Mats

[Marc van Arc]

they were at least 10 cms/4", if not bigger.
Perhaps Sid can expand a little. He's been watching them closely.

[Dave Rinaldo]

I have no personal experience with them, but Silurus has suggested them as a place to get other stuff:
http://www.rehobothaquatics.com/index2.html (The species is not listed in the "in stock" list, but use the contact page to enquire).

Rehobothaquatics (Toyin) is great but deal with West and Central African fish, so S. njassae wouldn't be in there inventory as it comes from Lake Malawi.

Again, I have no personal contact with these peopel (I've driven past New Braunfels several times, but I wasn't aware of them being there at the time):
http://www.ohiexchange.com/armke/index.html
[The web-site is a bit "ancient", but I believe the company is still active - Dave Rinaldo, can you confirm?]

Armkes was purchased by a friend, Dave, and moved to San Antonio.

A wonderful person to deal with

It is now called Dave's Rare Aquarium Fish

My S. njassae came from there

[sidguppy]

there are 6 Synodontis njassae in Zoozajac, and as far as I could see all genuine, although they were fairly diverse in bodyshape and markings.

at the time I believed a few might not be 100% njassae, but I tend to be a bit paranoid on the hybrid issue.

they varied from 3" to almost 6". at the time i found them fairly expensive, maybe because I'm used to this species being around 20-30E each.

and also I didn't carry the amount of cash with me to spend 240E on 6 catfishes.
knowing this fish is a shoaler I'm glad that I didn't make the mistake of buying 2 or 3.
close, but no sigar. cause if I had done that I know exactly what would have happened: I'd go back to the store within a week to get the rest and ofcourse those would have been sold already, Murphy being the utter bastard that he is, leaving me with a shoaling fish unproperly kept by someone who should know better

[Bas Pels]

and also I didn't carry the amount of cash with me to spend 240E on 6 catfishes.

They do accept plastic payments. in fact I mostly pay there without real money

[Richard B]

Just a slight word of caution - today i saw a tank of S.Njassae 2cm which looked suspiciously like S.Nigrita & this was at a lfs which i expected to be knowlegable about such things

[sidguppy]

They do accept plastic payments. in fact I mostly pay there without real money

as far as I know the only plastic i have that carries over borders is my VISA card and I didn't have it with me.
ah well, good thing,. because otherwise I'd have 6 more Riftlake catfishes.....in my Madagascar tank.

if they'd accept my postbank card, good thing I didn't know.

damn

Richard, if they look like nigrita's they're definitely not njassae.

the bodyshape of njassae is quite slim, leaning towards fish like Synodontis brichardi or S petricola.
and the coloration resembles multipunctatus a fair bit; a white golden background with a slight metallic sheen and loads of black spots.

the easiest to spot difference between njassae and the Tanganyikans is the finnage: Tanganyikans have black and white fins; njassae has fins that are similar colored as the body, never black patches or stripes or so. just dark spots on white.