Amazing som antsistrus: content in the aquarium

Catfish Ancistrus (Ancistrus dolichopterus) is called a unique fish, because it can be contained in any freshwater aquarium and adjacent to any fish. He does not know how to swim, but he perfectly cleanses the walls from various fouling.

Conditions of detention

The homeland of the ancistrus is South America. From there - from the wildest clean rivers - he got into our aquariums. However, it turned out that this fish is absolutely unpretentious in its content. It is suitable for almost any water hardness, salinity and even temperature. Within reasonable limits, of course. Som antsistrus - a peaceful vegetarian, so he does not like attacking neighbors. One can even say that he does not communicate very well with his neighbors, since he has enough brothers. And he's been busy all day - he's cleaning the walls. But it's not so easy to offend him: even aggressive cichlids and voracious Angolan soms do not touch the bearded neighbor. The main food of the catfish-cleaner is soft algae, which he gnaws from the walls of the aquarium, clay sculptures, stones, wide leaves. But if the soma-cleaner does not miss this food, he will start hooliganning - damaging aquatic plants. Therefore, it should be fed, for which it is better to use branded tableted or granulated fodder of vegetable origin.
Like all the brethren, the catfish antsistrus active at night, and in the afternoon prefers to hide under snags, climb into all kinds of grottos and caves.

Awesome appearance

Catfish antsstrus has a teardrop-flattened body with a wide heavy head. The main feature of his appearance is the mustache sticking out to the sides. In fact, it is, of course, no whiskers, but skin outgrowths and hypertrophied fins. The male mustache-outgrowths are much larger, so distinguishing them from females is very simple. Most catfishes have a monochrome-silvery abdomen, spotted sides and a coal-black back. Frightened or angry, catfish pale for a while. There is also an amazing fish - a white-pink or light-yellow ancestral albino. Experts have deduced some breeds possessing a unique color: leopard, bright yellow, pinkish, and even black in white peas. In general, all catfish-ancistrus are very beautiful aquarium fish, photos can easily confirm this.

Breeding in captivity

Uncomplicated catfish Can lay eggs sometimes even without any intervention from the person. True, eggs have very little chance of becoming fry.
To get a viable offspring, aquarists plant a couple of soms in a separate dwelling - an aquarium of liters per 50. The soil and plants are not needed there. But ceramic or bamboo tubes, stones, mules - are quite useful. Readiness for spawning is determined by the "puffiness" of the female. Place for masonry chooses som antsistrus-papa, and after the eggs then he takes care of. Caviar in gray catfish bright, sunny-orange. As soon as the caviar is ready, the female needs to be planted. It can harm children, in addition, a zealous father can even kill his girlfriend. As we can see, the parental instinct in the male is expressed many times stronger. Eggs ripen 4-7 days. Appearing thick fry hang a bunch on the site of the masonry for a couple of days. And then they begin to blur - at this moment their dad needs to be evicted. They need to be fed with a special fry for fry.