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Hi everyone! This is my first post here. A few months ago I got into keeping corydoras habrosus but looking online I'm seeing a lot of differing temperature ranges to keep them at.
Temps listed on various sites: 20 – 26°C / 68 - 79°F; 22° - 25°C / 72° - 79°F; 25 - 27°C / 77°F - 80°F; 22° - 30°C / 72 – 86°F.
I'd like to get a dwarf snow ball pleco L471, but they like it a bit warmer (79 - 84°F) than my current temp which is 76°F. I'm thinking of slowly increasing the temp in my tank to 79°F but I'm a bit wary cause this is at the very max that some sources list for habrosus.
If I kept the tank at 79°F, would both the habrosus and the pleco be able to thrive? What temperatures have you kept habrosus at with success? Has anyone kept them at 79°F without problem?
Thanks so much for your help!

Temp really is not an issue as the ranges of these two spp are very close. They are in the same drainage in fact, and in the dry season, C. habrosus is exposed to far higher temps than L 471 could ever tolerate.
What separates them in nature is their biotope. C. habrosus is found in white water systems in the llanos characterized by slow movement, harder, more alkaline water, and lots of leaf litter and driftwood. L 471 is from the main channel of the Orinoco which is a black water river with a strong current, low pH and hardness, high O2 levels, and a substrate of sand and stone.
My main concern, if I was trying the same set up, would be balancing the amount of current and high levels of dissolved oxygen L 471 needs with the cory's need for a still, peaceful environment.
There are lots of great plecos that live in the same environment as your C. habrosus that would be good choices: Farlowella, Hemiloricaria, Otocinclus, Panaque, Loricaria, and Hypostomus just to name a few.
-Shane

Hi Shane, thanks for getting back to me with that really good information. Well, that's good to hear that the temp wouldn't be an issue but tricky that they're not a great match in terms of biotope... you've given me a lot to consider. I'm rethinking things. Thank you!

Here is some more specific information from one of my collection logs. Note the temp!

Rio Santo Domingo, Cojedes State 7 April 2001
In its lower course the Santo Domingo is called a Rio while the upper portion is reffered to as Cano Santo Domingo. The exact collecting location was on the dirt road that leads west from highway 8 at Cano Benito approximately 40km north of El Baul. Since it is the dry season, the Santo Domingo is not a river anymore, but a series of unconnected pools. We collected from a pool under the bridge and turned up some very interesting fish. The pH was measured at 7.0 and the conductivity at 1,100 mu. The temperature was about 84F and the water had almost no visibility. In a glass container the water was the color of weak tea. This area is northern most range of Apistogramma macmasteri. The substrate was thick leaf litter and driftwood with no aquatic plants.

Collecting the leaf litter turned up

Corydoras aeneus "black"
Corydoras septentrionalis
Corydoras habrosus (thousands!)

I keep (and breed) C. habrosus at 78°F. to 79°F.

No problems. In my experience, I always prefer to keep tropical ANYTHING at the top of their temperature range as it seems to really be a disease preventative.

When I want to trigger a spawn, I do a 50% water change with water several degrees colder. At first I was finicky about this but found out that the "just drain, dump, and go" worked fine. The fish didn't mind at all. Oh, one other thing. And breeders will probably laugh at me about this, but I found another helpful trigger to be providing lots of micro worms to the breeding colony tank. Yep. Micro worms. My breeder colony is in a bare bottom tank and any micro worms that fall to the bottom are vacuumed up by the adults as well as any fry in the tank. The only other things I keep in that tank are some potted plants (Java fern and some random crypts) and some dried wild magnolia leaves. I did a bunch of experiments and air dried magnolia leaves were GREAT infusoria starters.

Probably the easiest tropical fish in the world to keep and breed.

Tom

I’m keeping mine at around 24.5’C / 76’F and they trigger with spawns with 30% water changes that are pretty fast and 5’C lower.
I was interested in comparing other water parameters as I’m fair success with the following and wondered how it compares to your own aquarium water:
TDS 80-100ppm
GH 6
KH 2
pH 6.6 - 6.8

Oh and mine absolutely go crazy for grindal worms.

Sam