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Until Adam gets around to resurrecting the Articles section, you can E-Mail me and I'll send you my Otocinclus article. You can request either Microsoft Word DOC format or Adobe PDF. A little service I'm providing until such times as the Articles section is back on stream.

I've now had Otocinclus for nearly 12 years. In some respects I must be lucky, because most of my Otocinclus deaths have been from old age. Including my now famous 'Methuselah' Otocinclus that lived over 9 years. Would have been 10 years if it had made it to December 2004.

Oh, and GirlieGirl has hit upon an extremely important aspect of Otocinclus selection at the LFS - provenance is EVERYTHING with these fishes. If they look well fed, chances are they'll survive the transition to your own aquarium a lot better than if they look half starved. This is covered in my article by the way.

If you feel you have to rescue some poor benighted specimens from a piscine Black Hole of Calcutta, do so on the understanding that even your best TLC may not save you from experiencing woeful levels of attrition amongst the poor guys. However, the message is slowly but surely spreading even among wholesalers, that if these fishes are kept in quarters where they have lots of algae to munch upon, their survival rates are VASTLY improved, and consequently, the wholesalers suffer fewer losses on the balance sheet. Likewise the retailers that make provision to keep these fishes well fed with algae.

Something I describe in my article is the "Otocinclus Pet Rock". what is this? Simple. Any artefact that is allowed to sit in a jar of water in direct sunlight for a few days until it acquires a nice coat of green fur. Though my favourite artefacts for this purpose are small pieces of bogwood (because that approximates closely what the Otocinclus graze from in the wild), just about any aquarium safe solid artefact will do - aquarium safe rocks, Mopani wood, even garish plastic tank ornaments can be pressed into service in this way. Personally I can't think of a better use for some of the horrors that are sold as 'aquarium decoorations' than to coat them in algal fuzz and offer them to Otocinclus as a banquet, but that's just me

If I were you, I'd find a couple of jars that can be pressed into service, a collection of small artefacts that you know are safe to put in an aquarium, then stick them in hte jars on a windowsill in direct sunlight and cover them with old aquarium water. The combination of intense sunlight (here in the UK it's untypically tropical at the moment, so an Otocinclus Pet Rock Farm should produce algae in industrial batch quantities!) and fish urine/faeces from the old water (gravel vac waste water is ideal for this) will result in your chosen collection of Otocinclus nibble toys sporting freaky-looking algal Mohicah hairdos in no time, which your Otocinclus will dine upon with relish. Fire up an Otocinclus Pet Rock Farm before you go looking for more specimens, then when you find your replacement fishes, treat them to a serious algal banquet. Keep doing that on a regular basis if your aquarium algal population is fairly sparse, and your Otocinclus should live long, happy lives.

Tell you what - when I first set up what was to become in the fullness of time the infamous Panda Fun Palace, and decided right from the word 'go' to keep Otocinclus, you should have seen the looks I got when I told people I was cultivating algae ... Paid off in the end though!


Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

Great notes on algea cultivation i believe the same may be deployed to feed the african cichlid fry!

Another tip i've heard for transporting ottos is to put a live plant in the bag with them. Not sure how this helps, or if it even helps at all but it's definatly worth a try.

Also when you acclimatise them try taking a bit more time doing it, adding your tank water to the bag slower.

My LFS encloses his fish bags in layers of newspaper to darken the interior - this is particularly helpful with fishes that are sensitive to transport shock such as Rummy Nosed Tetras, so it probably helps a lot with Otocinclus too. This would probably not combine well with the live plant trick mentioned above, but popping a small clump of Java Moss or something similar in the bag during the transition from bag to aquarium sounds to me like a good idea. Hat tip for that suggestion!

If your Otocinclus are in a bag that isn't darkened, however, taking along a small piece of plant to put in with them would probably help. Even better, on reflection, is this - in advance of your purchase, get hold of a small piece of plastic, cultivate it as an "Otocinclus Pet Rock", and pop that in the bag, give them something to nibble on for the duration of the journey.

That's what this forum is for - get our heads together for ideas on keeping our fish happy! I have to admit I wouldn't have thought of popping an "Otocinclus Pet Rock" into the bag during shipping if Bonny hadn't mentioned popping a plant in ... consequently, I'd point potential Otocinclus keepers here to this thread for the time being until the articles have been sorted out. Oh, and Bonny, I'll update my own Otocinclus article in the light of your suggestion

EDIT : Just updated my Otocinclus article to reflect the above. And Bonny has been duly credited with setting the ball rolling by the way. So that these changes will be reflected in the online version once Adam resurrects the articles, I'll prepare a fresh version of the HTML file so that this suggestion will be permanent.


Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

wow we are generating alot of fresh ideas here!

looking to start a jar of algae once i can catch some sunlight there isnt much of it ehre at the moment!
sort of wishing i was there in england soaking up some of the sunshine!!! i do have to find a way to grow some though.

my remaining otto seems to be fine he doesnt appear to be scared of the other fish often joining them for meals and rests on the gravel.

will look into finding him some friends and those transporting ideas will definately come in handy for a safe journey home!

---

Truth doesn't always win friends but it influences them

I have to say that is quite some turnaround in events ... Sydney is dull and overcast and we're blazing hot ...

Returning to Otocinclus food, I think it was Cup_of_Lifenoodles who suggested getting hold of some perspex sheet and cutting it into small rectangles for the purpose of growing algae nibbles for assorted algae eating fish. Only trouble with that being that I'm not sure if perspex is denser than water. Mind you, some heavy acrylic plastics are ideal - and you can get them pre-cut because they're used for signwriting. Might be a good idea to test them for aquarium safety first though!


Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

If the perspex doesn't float you could just wrap a couple of those weights that are usually wrapped around plants.

AS for the plant in the bag idea, can't remember where I heard it, think it was on here years ago when i was last active here.

I personally have never had any real trouble keeping ottos, i think i only ever had one die in close proximity to having being moved and i think that may have been one of my angels faults

Also are there not several species of otocinclus? Some being rather more fragile than others.

There are indeed several species of Otocinclus, but the trouble that we aquarists have here is that the Genus is LONG overdue for taxonomic revision - a situation not helped by the plethora of invalid, superseded and trade names in circulation. Mine, for example, are sold as Otocinclus arnoldi, which the webmaster at Planet Catfish told me was properly Otocinclus mariae, but a look at Fishbase says that Otocinclus arnoldi is properly named otocinclus flexilis ... here is the Fishbase page for the Genus Otocinclus, which highlights some of the fun and games involved. Note that Fishbase appears to be in need of some updating itself, in that no mention is made in this list of valid Otocinclus species of otocinclus cocama, the sky high desirable but still woefully expensive Zebra Otocinclus ...

Additionally, Fishbase has a photo on its page for Otocinclus arnoldi that does NOT resemble my fishes - the fish illustrated there is a mottled fish with a broken band along the body midline, while my fishes have a solid black band from snout to caudal peduncle, which MUCH more closely resemble the illustration of Otocinclus mariae on Planet Catfish and bear a good visual relationship to the illustration of Otocinclus affinis on Fishbase, and bears an even CLOSER visual relationship to the Fishbase illustration of otocinclus hoppei, a species I didn't know existed until I checked Fishbase's Genus list! My fishes also look somewhat like the Fishbase photo of Otocinclus macrospilus just to confuse matters, as well as resembling their photo of Otocinclus vittatus ...

In fact, some of the fishes listed as Otocinclus ar e, according to Fishbase, properly members of other Genera - most notably Otocinclus depressicauda whose valid scientific name is cited as Hisonotus depressicauda.

So, take it as read that identifying Otocinclus species correctly is a potential minefield - here be dragons.


Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002