FuglyDragon

and lastly CO2 which is about the only thing that dosnt come in tap water in sufficient quantities, your fish will produce some but its usually the limiting factor in plant growth. The problem is if any of these 'ferts' run out then the plants stop growing as quickly, and the various algae which are able to grow perfectly well without all the ferts start taking over. If you have enough of everything else but not enough CO2 then you will get black beard algae (the usual problem) Not enough nitrates often leads to BGA or green slime etc etc Its usually the lack of a nutrient that causes algae not an over supply of it. Because lack of the nutrient is slowing plant growth and allowing the algae to feed on the excess other ferts avaialble.

if you cut back back on CO2 in an established tank you will likely get an algae explosion. Basically everything needs to be in balance, too much or too little of any one thing and you will get algae. Your Macro Ferts are... Nitrates... produced by your filter as it breaks down fish poop and decaying material Phosphates... usually enough in the tap water and fish food Pottasium... usually enough in tap water if you do regular water changes. all the of these can be added as powdered fert if you think any is lacking Micro Ferts Mainly Iron (FE) and other minerals in minute traces, this is usually in your tap water (unless its really soft like here in Christchurch) so again regular (weekly 10-20%) water changes. But Iron is easy to dose (thats what most commercial aquatic plant foods are) Light Usually 2 to 3 flouro tubes are fine unless you are trying for real explosive growth then go with halides or the like. Arouind 10 hours per day will work, and no sun light hitting the tank if possible.

For 'lush' plant growth CO2 is a must, but be prepared to spend a fair bit of time trimming and pruning, 'lush' growth is not allways desirable depends how much time you have bto devote to gardeneing, but no doubt in my mind CO2 injection = more growth. DIY CO2 works fine, but you eventually get sick of mixing it up and the variances and go with pressurised. Undergravel heater cables create a moving current which stops the substrate stagnateing and the dreaded black root problem after 2 to 3 years, i have 2 tanks running with cables and no black root problems after 4 years. I also reccomend a JBL product called aquabasis as a undersubstrate boost for new planted tanks, its cheap and works great.

Great links, thanks for posting those.

Wonder how on earth it would get into a high altitude tiny spring creek in the wilderness miles from anywhere ? the creek in question was draining an area of swampy marshy ground and was at most 2 to 3 feet wide and maybe 18 inches to 2 feet deep. Ill get some close up photos of it this weekend and post them.

Thanks Alan.

Don't see how it could get into a small creek in the middle of nowhere if its not a native, have also seen it in the Irwell stream that flows into lake Ellesmere.

Anyone able to ID this plant ? I filmed it in a small tributary of the upper Rakaia River in North Canterbury, collected some and its growing well in my fish room, I just have no idea what it is, anyone care / able to enlighten me ?

found this on youtube, some great underwater shots of royal plecs in their wild environment.

Dull eyes are L191 and they come out of Peru (as do a lot of nigrolineatus) L191 (dull eyed) is smaller overall than L190(nigrolineatus) both MUST have wood in the tank or they will waste away, and they produce huge amounts of waste (sawdust) so efficent mechanical filtration (way over and above biological requirements) is also essential. Gold line Royal are one of the many fish in the L027 group they come from Rio (river) Tocantins in brasil, it is not known wether the various diffent types of royal plecs (L027) from different amazon river systems are variations on the same species 'Panaque nigrolineatus' or different. Your fish look like L190 Nigrolineatus (black lines) to me. Strictly speaking once a fish is described it looses its L number, so Panaque nigrolineatus (very rough translation 'Wood/Canoe eating black lined') is more correct.

Its not so much TM's rules and conditions its that contracts arnt binding on minors, so you have no real legal protection if something goes wrong, not that its likely to the media blows the very very few problems up out of all proportions. I have over 40,000 trades and have only come across 1 dishonest trader (and he wasnt even a trademe user, the courier delivered to the wrong address twice and the guy signed for it both times them refused to return it, the courier company sorted it out).

Baby BN will naturally look for a dark 'cave' to hide in and a nice dark filter is just perfect for them. My tanks run through a sump system with 6-8 tanks all plumbed together and i regularly find baby BN and baby cory's that have gone thru their tank overflow, down the plumbing into the sump through the filter boxes been sucked into the sump pump and then up the plumbing into one of the other tanks.

Your going up just to view those zebra plecs arnt you.. admit it.... I was trying to dream up an excuse to go to Auckland... maybe a trip to kelly tarltons for the kids (honest) with side trip to check out the zebras, if they have any left that is. Thanks for the advice on pumps, gives me several options to consider

Air Pump for a small fish room Sick of eheim diaphram pumps crapping out on me so looking for a single pump to handle approx 20 tanks in my garage / fish room. Tanks are all on sumps so air is used mainly for airlifts into floating fry tubs, airstones and a few foam filters in fry tanks. Im currently running 3 Eheim 400's but just had another diaphram let go, on top of a broken arm, and the outlets breaking easily im less than happy with them. Anyone used an abaquamedic mistral ? or have any other recommendations ?

my bamboo caves last about 2 years, the plecs often eat the ends out of them so i silicone a flat rock on the end, i sometimes silicone them to a wall tile cut in half to hold them down too, or just put a rock or wood on top.

Havent tried hydrogen peroxide, but increaseing your co2 (if you are using it) or seachem excel at full dose will knock back black algae quickly

spirulina powder helps with raising them too, i mix it with water add use an eheim liquidoser to dose it regularly

I have never really liked 239, not for any good reason they just don't 'tickle my fancy' as it where, have never had one so no experiance with them. John at Organisms has them in from time to time, not sure if he has one at the moment although he did have several fancy plecs when i called in today, 2 nice royals, and a L47 plus others

from my experiance gold nugget (any of the 3 is a poor choice for a planted or community tank) 1. mine used to strip my sword plants, and I have read other reports of them shreding plants. 2. Baryancistrus (gold nuggets) like warm water , (28 - 30) not the best for plants (yes i know you can keep them in a 24c community tank but they dont do well) 3. bary. need highly oxygenated water, which is hard to do at high temps, so you are gonna need plenty of current from powerheads, not best for planted tank. 4. I have never had probs with multiple gold nuggets fighting, but i have had them bedat up on other similar sized plecs. If you want to see these guys at their best put them in a warm tank with gravel / sand / bogwood and some shelter stones (bamboo caves are usefull too), add a couple of powerheads to churn things up and remember not to feed to much protein and they thrive. If you want to have a frustrateing time add them to a planted community of around 24c and feed them community flakes, then watch while they struggle for 2 to 3 years then die... If you are still looking for a fancy plec to go in a general community style tank i'd recommend a sunshine / goldie L014 http://www.planetcatfish.com/scobinanci ... reatus.php just as colorful, about same price and in my experiance far easier to keep happy and healthy

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http://mikesaquatics.co.nz/index.php?option=com_morfeoshow&task=view&gallery=18&Itemid=78 There is one of these in Organisms in ChCH at the moment, didnt catch the price though sorry

I am sorry, but without wild imports they will be gone from NZ and it wont take anything like 10 years... I should have been more specific in my original post... I doubt any NZ hobby breeder has the resources to maintain a viable genetic pool of 'fancy' plecos. I doubt the hobby as a whole has the resources, there simply arnt enough of these rare plecs imported into the country. Unless we as a hobby are able to procure hundreds of identifiable genetic 'individuals' they will eventually become extremly inbred, and eventually they will 'die out' Even if we manage to breed a few pairs, it won't be long before the successive generations become inbred and likely sterile.. I really can't see a captive breeding program in NZ for rare 'fancy' plecs being able to maintain a genetically viable population without occasional wild imports to refresh the gene pool. thats not even taking into account the fact that as the scientific commmunity has yet to positivelly identify and classify the vast majority of these catfish, so ensureing we have 'pure strains' of the same species to breed from is a major hurdle. Zoo's and similar organisations should be left to raiseing viable genetic populations for re intorduction to replace dwindling wild stocks, or endangoured wild stocks, and no I can't see any NZ zoo becoming involved in a plec breeding program either... but they are breeding kiwis here to try to bolster wild populations... so maybe one day we might see similar programs in South America for dwindling populations of 'fancy' plecs... Good luck to all the other pleco fanatics out there trying to captive breed the 'fancy' plecs, I certainly have my own colonies I am hopeing / trying to breed but I wouldnt rely on us as a group being able to maintain 'NZ populations' of any of these fish indefinately by captive breeding....

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Because I am far more likely to order a 'blue spotted pleco' when i see it on the list than if they had called it a 'starlight'which it what it was... 2 more unidentifiable spotted ancistrus for my collection look exactly the same as my other starlights to my eye... and why oh why are they all females ??? 6 females, whats the odds... my 2 cents on the whole bn hybrid thing... remebering the GBA's are just a genetic morph of one of the 'common bn' species, a variation on the albino morph. albino BN's are also a genetic morph on one of the 'common bn' species These are natural mutations that can and do occur in nature across many different species (the GBA morph is common in reptiles apparently,and there are pictures of lions etc on the web with the same color mutation) it is called Amelanism Such mutations rarely survive in nature because they are easy prey for predators so wild examples are rarely found but they do exist. (There are pics of an albino mango plec that was wild caught) So the GBA and Albino that we know have been created by selective crossbreeding anyway to fix the mutation and make it reoccur in each generation. They are effectively 'genetically engineered' by man because they appeal to keepers of ornamental fish As such there is no wild populations of either. In my opinion as they were created to appeal to hobbyists I see no problem in futher hybridistaion to make other color morphs, variations. Maintainign pure genetic lines of any species is beyond most hobbyists abilities anyways and IMHO should be left up to zoos and similar organisations with trained scientific staff.

Its at times like this that I really wish I had taken Biology at school Would be good to actually understand all the recessive and dominant genetics stuff. Interesting you note different shades of yellow in the albinos, I have also noticed this in GBA plecs in my LFS, there seems to be two different shades of yellow, one pale one gold both of which have the black eyes. Could be caused by a lot of factors other than genetics though, such as food, water conditions etc Whilst I agree that ancistrus sp3 and L144 are / were probably different species. I feel that most of the GBAs we see in New Zealand now days are hybrids and not true L144. Not that that makes them any less spectacular in any way, an adult male GBA against a dark brackground is still a very impressive specimen no matter what his genetic background.