FishProfiles.com Message Forums

In my 75g tank I have this:



A piece of driftwood, three large fake plants, gravel, and river rocks.

I still haven't been able to decide what fish to stock my tank with. For the past few months I've been working 60 hours a week and stocking the tank hasn't been at the top of my list. I'm lucky to get to the bank while it's open. It's Wednesday and my uncashed, undeposited paycheck is still in my purse.

We had an oscar for a short period of time. Someone had returned him because their jack dempsey was beating him up. He was depressed, wouldn't eat. Did nothing but stare at his reflection all day long, and then when we got the pleco he just constantly charged him over and over until his head had scratches all over it from the plecos fins. I even took the oscar out, added the driftwood and plants, redecorated, put in the pleco, then added the oscar. Didn't work, he knew where he was and that's HIS tank... even though he didn't seem to like it very much. Everyone in the tank was unhappy. So back he went.

Now I have a pleco and the rosey reds I bought to try and get the oscar to eat... or give him something to harrass other than the poor pleco. They're doing splendid actually.



I have the worst luck with these kinds of things. I think I'm just going to buy a bucket full of neons.

Poor lil pleco . If you have 2 tanks, try putting them next to each other, the oscar won't be able to touch the pleco and eventually may think it impossible. A good way to test fish aggressiveness is to float another fish in the same bag, if they start attacking the bag, there meanies. This isn't much help... but gl on what ever fish choice you make.

ham... your one weird person.. . well i just have a few generalized questions to ask. What size tank(s) do you have, i have to ask becasue looks to me like you got yourself a nice lookin common pleco. well i guess i only had the one question to ask, lol.

Maybe the problem is that it is only one oscar? If you had a few, maybe it would direct its attention away from the poor slow pleco and towards the other similar paced oscars? I haven't had much experience with oscars, but some aggressive fish just need something faster to take out their aggression on. Maybe you could even get giant danios or something because they'll outswim the oscar if it chases them? Good luck ={

The pottery that growls!

Depends exactly what species your pleco is but it's gonna need a tank at least around 90-100g in the future. Even the smallest common pleco will get over 1' and have plenty of mass. I'm not good at iding commons since I just prefer to avoid all of them but you can take a look at Pterygoplichthys and Hypostomus species over on planetcatfish and see what matches.

You can stick about anything in there with him but I'd avoid large agressive cichlids if you don't want to potentially face the same problem. Multiple oscars in a 75g with a large pleco would not be a good idea. Maybe in 90+ gallons but 1 oscar fills a 55-75g pretty well by itself and the pleco is also going to at least come close to overstocking the 75g along with not being able to move around very easily.

Might be worth you reading this thread.

http://www.fishprofiles.com/files/threads/35170.1.htm?0.2733355#

This is the only oscar tank that looks pleasing (at least to me):

http://www.aquahobby.com/tanks/e_tank0008.php

Note that the owner talks about building a larger tank (the one in the picture is 160 G) and the necessity to keep oscars with some company of their own. Am I understanding correctly that you returned the oscar or not?

BTW

For the past few months I've been working 60 hours a week

welcome to the club, you are not alone

I don't want to sound harsh, but a little bit of reading about the requirements of fish that you are interested in keeping might be of benefit. Ultimately, it will spare you a lot of disappointment in your time off when you want to enjoy your aquarium and the fish, it certainly works for me

Yes, I returned the oscar to the petstore I got him from. I was afraid he was going to poke an eye out. Even though before adding the pleco I tried to break up the territory by adding new things and moving aorund the old ones, he just wasn't impressed. My ex husband got the pleco a new home with someone that has a 120g. Then I spent over an hour collecting all the feeder fish with a net. So, as soon as the pleco goes to his tank, I'll be starting over fresh. I'll probably just get a goldfish, lol.

Glad to hear that things seem to have been fixed up all right. Incidentally, it is indeed a Pterygoplicthys species, either P. pardalis or P. disjunctivus, but these are two species that can't easily be differentiated from each other without seeing the belly, so unless you're really curious and get a picture of that I can't identify it further. Many of the Pterygoplichthys species are sold willy-nilly as common plecs; many of them look quite similar anyway, so it doesn't really make a difference to most people.

Figuring out what you want can mean as much as just taking a trip to the fish store and looking around.

--------------------------------------------
The aquarist is one who must learn the ways of the biologist, the chemist, and the veterinarian.

Umm - it looks an awful lot like a L66 King Tiger (Scribble) to me. I'm having a look at the pic, and a look at mine and not seeing a whole heap of difference. But then I'm probably wrong!!

If it is a L66, they stay small. I'd love a tank with just plecs, I love them so much, they're such interesting fish!

-------------------------------------------------
I like to think that whoever designed marine life was thinking of it as basically an entertainment medium. That would explain some of the things down there, some of the unearthly biological contraptions