What is an oscar?

[MagickFish]

Okand now for a stupid newbie question. What exactly is an oscar. I imagine somting little, round, orange and cudly whit fins when i hear that name, somthing like my avatar picture, witch i asume is not the case. So what is this fish?

[kimmers318]

Oscars are a type of cichlid, and they may be cute and small when you get them as babies but they quickly become large fish with big appetites.
Here is a pic of one of my husbands oscars that we have had for 6 months, they were about 2 inches when we bought them.
http://i65.photobucket.com/albums/h216/kimmers318/100_1104.jpg

Google search oscar fish and you will find all kinds of info on them. Very popular fish.

[MagickFish]

Oh he was not round and orange and cudly, though he was beautiful. I always imagined the fish varaity of the orange little cat named oscar in the diney movie. Oh well. Thanks for the information. What do those fish eat? other fish?

[rollie]

they are big mean fish. will eat anything. what they can not eat they will kill.
they been known to bite the hand that feed them, to. but they can make very good pets.

[MagickFish]

So one should not have theese fish in an aquarium together whit smaler fish? He looks a bit mean, the fish in the photo, how inteligent are they by the way?

[fishgurl]

Oscars are fish that can get rather large 12-14 inches sometimes bigger. they require lots of space. and have very healthy appetites, they can handle a range of tank conditions to some degree. oscars come in many colors and patterns. they are in the cichlid family. they also have varying degrees of personalities just like we do. some can be quite mean while others can get very tame. these fish are sometimes referred to as the dog of the world. i have one that is in a tank by its self because if placed with any others it just lies on its side like its dead. while i have another one that has a pleco and a cichlid as a tank mate. and yet another that will eat anything that will fit in its mouth. the are great fish to have, to watch and to learn from but require lots of space. this is not a fish for someone that only has room for a small tank as one need at least a 75 gal. to live at its best. these fish are quite intelligent. i keep plastic ping pong balls in my tanks for mine and the play with them daily and my fish know who i am. and will swim right up to the top to my hand and eat from it. 2 of my three even welcome the occasional light petting. also i feed cichlid pellets, freeze dried krill, earth worms, and crickets , as well as ghost shrimp, they will take a fly off the top of the water if it make the unfortunate mistake of landing there . there is lots of info on the web as kimmers said just google oscars hth

[William]

They are extremely smart (for a fish) and can even learn tricks.

[MagickFish]

Thank you for the information fishgurl. Do they actualy survive jumping out of the tank and landing, fish are rather fragile, exept pike, I used to go fishing whit my grandfather when a little girl, and those pikes would survive nearly anything less than being turned into fish cakes and eaten. The oscars look wery nice. But I think I will stick whit somthing smaler, and a bit less tothey. How log do they live by the way?

[fishgurl]

well i have a friend that has had a oscar that is 8 yrs old. and has survived floor diving on more than one occasion and is about 12 inches long. he now has locks on the tanks lids to keep that from happning. all 3 of mine are about 2 1/2 yrs old and are already 11 inches. so they can live for a long time. this is one of those fish i would highly recomend to anyone that has room for one. they are great. what personalities. i would not trade mine for anything. the only thing that comes close to the personality it a betta! lol

[MagickFish]

Well i am considering buying a bigger tank if we get the bigger apartment we have been looking at, but I wasplanning on filling it whit cute little tetras and platys and such, but then I want long lived fish as I have a phobia against dead fish.

[fishgurl]

just keep in mind with a oscar the bigger the better and filtration, filtration, filtration!! they are very messy and as far as plants go if there not nailed down consider them fair game. its a daily chore just keeping my plants in place. they seem to like them better if they can pull them around the tank. lol.

[tieu]

they are big mean fish. will eat anything. what they can not eat they will kill.
they been known to bite the hand that feed them, to. but they can make very good pets.

lol they dont kill they are very friendly fish i got 3 oscars(5 inch), 2 albino catfish(1 inch maybe), 2 gourami's, 10 mollies, 2 silver dollars( 2inches), 5 gold severums(2-3 inches) and a barcoo grunter( 9-10 inches) they all get along fine especially the oscars and the grunter the oscars usually folow the oscar around :)

[fishgurl]

i learned with my three that if you know you are going to have room for them say 125 g or 150 g that if you start them out together young and small that the will usually get along with each other and with other tank mates if added all at the same time. the only reason y mine are all in separate tanks now is space a 55 is not really big enough for one let alone two. so i am currently housing my in 55s alone.and mine readily get along with other fish i even had a cichlid in the tank with my oscar until the cichlid started picking on my o. my friends o enjoys the company of gold fish but nothing else. it really depends on their personalities and they truly have likes and dislikes

[MagickFish]

So thy can be kept whit others? I guess it is like you say, it is personality based, some big fish are frindly and never hurt the smaler fish, quite happy whit the food they got served, whit others try to eat even bigger fish then themself.

[Anonymous]

i would not suggest placing anything small enough to fit in its mouth you may come home and find it missing. but if there tank is big enough you can keep with others. check out this site. www.oscarfish.com its a all oscar site as well as www.theoscarspot.com

[Full3R]

strangely enough in my tigers oscar and albino oscar tank that they share there is a peice of pipe that looks suspiciously like the one in the oscar pic that kimmers showed

[fishgurl]

maybe there jumping on a plane! living a double life..lol.