Question about Bumblebee Catfish

[Sasquatch]

We decided to order a Bumblebee Catfish (Microglanis iheringi) on Reptileguy2727's recommendation. We just got the call from the LFS and they should be arriving next week.

We've looked around a few places and there is some good information, but we have a few questions about our specific setup.

1. We have salt in our aquarium (1tsp/gal), will this be safe for him? We can dilute the salt with our weekly water changes, so it's not a problem, but we'd like to know so we can start the water changes.

2. What type of diet? Specifically for the quarantine, but also longer term. We have access to Nutrafin and Hikari at the LFS. In his final home there are loads of snails for him to much on and out platties should be producing babies he can stalk, but we will probably supplement him too. Any suggestions? I was thinking little bits of beef heart and/or earthworms.

3. Anything else we should watch out for? We know that it's a scaleless fish, so treating certain things will be more difficult. But anything else?

Thanks all.

[Abbeys_Mom]

Here's an interesting article on them.
http://www.scotcat.com/factsheets/mi...s_iheringi.htm

[Drumachine09]

Just so you know, if you havent already heard this, you will almost never see him, unless you use subdued lighting. If you have a pair of live bearers such as platties or guppies in your tank, he will eat the fry are small enough.

[Sasquatch]

Just so you know, if you havent already heard this, you will almost never see him, unless you use subdued lighting. If you have a pair of live bearers such as platties or guppies in your tank, he will eat the fry are small enough.

Yeah, that's actually sort of the point. We only have a 10 gallon, so we don't want the platy population exploding on us. We've already got babies and they're not even out of quarantine!

Thanks for the article Abbeys_Mom, it's handy. What I'm most worried about is the salt levels. I looked it up other places and it looks like we'll have to lower the levels. It shouldn't be too much of a problem though, as long as it's gradual.

[Abbeys_Mom]

No problem, glad to help :)

[Sasquatch]

Well, we went to the LFS today and they have arrived. We'll pick them up next week once we get our current fish out of quarantine and the water changed.

Any recommendations about diet for either Hikari or Nutrafin?

[Abbeys_Mom]

I've used both. I prefer Nutrafin (price wise), but I did by Hikari for my cichlids. I think it depend on what fish you have. Cheap fish, Cheap food. $75 Cichlid, $10 food :)

[Fishguy2727]

Hikari Sinking Carnivore Pellets will get them doing great. Why do you have salt in there? Are you still adding it, or did you add it once and are still getting it out with water changes? Guppies and platies do not need it. If you have the tank setup right you can get it so that they hide in sight of you. What I usually do is just lean a small piece of slate against the glass and make sure there isn't anywhere else that is more appealing. They will be happy in there and you will be able to check on them. Do they have the wide light bars? (Are the dark and light bars about equal width?)

[Sasquatch]

We'll try to find those pellets. I was leaning towards the Hikari stuff, mostly on your recommendation from the diet article. Comparing the nutritional information convinced me that the price is worth it. Paying for the Hikari isn't huge and at 8$CAN, it's the most expensive fish we've ever bought , so might as well splurge!

As for the salt, it's for the platies. I know it's not essential, but most of the places we've read about say that a little salt is good for the platies. But now that were getting the catfish, we'll dilute it with our weekly water changes. It'll probably help our plants look healthier too, at least I hope.

We'd have bought it today, but we have platies in quarantine with salty water, so we didn't want to introduce him into that. The quarantine ends Sunday and we'll have enough aged water to add him in on Tuesday.

My girlfriend will be adding a few rocks for him to hide behind, we already have two others as well as a resin cave for him to hide in, so he should be fine. We may not see him too often, but we're usually around a couple of hours after lights out, so you never know.

As for the fish, it's exactly like the image you sent us from Planet Catfish (of which I am know a proud member ) and apparently the LFSs supplier is from South America and knows about this species.

[Fishguy2727]

My platies bred like crazy with absolutely no salt. I used to think that salt will help most freshwater fish, but when I really looked into it I found that in general it will cause more harm than good long term, and it is usually only beneficial in tanks where other conditions are not ideal. Compared to how I used to keep fish a long time ago it would help, but with proper filtration and water changes you will get better results than if you use salt. The absolute best results I got with platies was in a 10 gallon when I was doing about 90% water changes with a Whisper 40. They got HUGE. The only platies I have heard of that were as big came out of a pond. All I'm saying is that I don't think salt is beneficial the way some make it out to be, water quality is more important and much more beneficial. I guess it doesn't matter as long as you are cutting it off.