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Hey guys - my new 4ft tank is now 11days into the nitrogen cycle.

Just while i'm waiting for that to finish cycling (yes, by this century please!:P) I plan to house a pair of Megalechis thoracatum, 4 Dianema urostriatum, 2 Raphaels, and 1 A. pectinifrons.

Any other suggestions to what might possibly be good tankmates? I don't really have any specific experience in keeping loricariids (previously only just tried BNs) so any other good starter plecos that aren't gonna be too big or aggressive I wouldn't mind either:)

thanks!

Cory_lover wrote:any other good starter plecos

You might consider or any of the numerous species; but the tank probably isn't fully cycled yet.

What are the other dimensions of the tank?

I have L128's in a 4ft tank, but it's 48 x 18 x 15 (L x W x H), so a bit wider than the average 4 ft tank.

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Mats

ah mine's 4ft x 14" x 16" (L x W x H). I don't think 4" will make much of a difference will it? Well unless it's a massively huge fish that needs a really big turning diameter, in which case I'd probably not be interested in anyway....

The rule I go by is 4L x 2L x 2L. By this rule, your max length is 14"/2 -> 7". Could probably get away with some slightly larger plecos, e.g. , or . Of course smaller species work fine too.

It obviously also depends on what else you plan on keeping in there - is it a breeding project tank, or a community tank?

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Mats

Oooh all 3 suggestions look pretty cool. now just hafta find out if they're imported into Australia!:P hahaha

Cory_lover wrote:Oooh all 3 suggestions look pretty cool. now just hafta find out if they're imported into Australia!:P hahaha

Yes, that would of course be another factor to weigh into the equation.

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Mats

Megalechis thoracatum, 4 Dianema urostriatum, 2 Raphaels, and 1 A. pectinifrons.

actually I wouldn't add anymore bottomdwelling catfishes.
especially no territorial ones or cavedwelling ones, so no Ancistrinae.
it's just a 4 foot tank, wich is small.

non territorial Loricariids would be fine of course, like , , , , , and the like.

those species would not compete with the doradids.

other catfishes wich fit in nicely would be Auchenipterids. especially the smaller ones and Helogenes.

many of these like to rest in dense plants (wich should be there) or rootwork with narrow crevices.
Tracheleiichthys decaradiatus for example would make a great addon. or Tatia galaxias. or Entomocorus spp.

all these feed on the surface and have no foodcompetition with the Calllichthydae or the Doradids.

[mod edit: add CLOG tags and fix a couple of minor typos --Mats]

Sidguppy: Good point - I wasn't looking that far back into the history when I made the suggestions. I'd be particularly worried that the which are rather timid and with more competition they will probably be (more) outcompeted at feeding time.

On the positive side, at least some forms of, are relatively easy to breed, so should be available as captive bred species in Australia.

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Mats

Hmmm the auchenipterids are quite interesting indeed, and they're from south america too (i'm trying to keep to the biotope), but never kept one before. wait, i think i've never ever seen one before! l0l . With the Sturisomas, I have seen them in Australia, and are imported at quite a large size (10-15cm in general) and since i've not had much experience with loricariids before, I wasn't sure if I should get them.

Sidguppy, I see your point about competition of space though, so i might go for some auchenipterids if they are avail here:)

In my personal experience, Sturisoma aren't hard to keep.

Breeding them isn't very hard either until the eggs hatch and the fry expect food to get to them, rather than forage for food - I use a coarse sand-paper to grind Hikari Algae Wafers into powder that settles all over the tank. I don't have huge survival rate on my fry, about 10-30% survive to 5cm/2" size [at which point the survival rate is near 100%], but I get a batch every 2 weeks, so I still have plenty of them - recently got rid of over 20 juveniles at around 2", and I still have a few... A batch of eggs is around 50 eggs, so I expect to get about 5-10 fry of salable size from each batch. They take about 4 months to reach 2" in size.

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Mats

Wow sounds pretty good! But should I get an adult pair from my lfs, or look for juveniles then mature them myself? Also, if I have a pair in the 4ft, I'm guessing it'll be sufficient space, but what about that whole issue of caves, and territoriality? If I add pipes for them, is that good enough?

They are not cave-dwellers. They like to sit on branches, leaves of plants, walls of the tank, and such, rather than in caves. Eggs are usually laid on the tank-wall. [Obviously, with your other inhabitants, you probably have to move the eggs out of the main tank to hatch them].

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Mats