Zebras and another pleco?

Orion · Post by **Orion** » Tue Jan 03, 2006 6:09 pm

I haven't gone up to Pittsburgh yet to get my Zebras, but I'm starting to set up the tank for them. I was reading up on my L260 today and saw that, according to the site, she wasn't going to get any bigger. She's only about 3.5 inches, and very very shy. From what I've read, Zebras and Queen Arabesques have very similar prefered environments, and are both non-aggressive fish. Would it be okay to keep her with Zebras?

INXS · Post by **INXS** » Fri Jan 06, 2006 1:20 pm

Keeping several different plecos together can lead to hybridizing , especially since they are both hypancistrus.

Personally I have kept them together Queens and zebras, without much problem.
If you are trying to breed however, I would not reccommend it. Personally I have never had any plecos breed which are housed with others and I have tried keeping about a dozen or so colonies in different mixes.

Adam · Post by **Adam** » Fri Jan 06, 2006 1:43 pm

I agree with INXS on this one. It is advisable to keep Hypancistrus species separate if at all possible as there is a real possibility of hybridisation occuring. There is a pretty well documented instance of this happening over at Planet Catfish if you want to read up more about it.

For a short while I had a group of juvenile L399 in with a group of L46 while their tank was maturing. Even though both are Hypancistrus species the L399 were a bit more bold than the zebras and out competed them for food.

Adam

Adam · Post by **Adam** » Fri Jan 06, 2006 2:35 pm

I managed to find the article that I mentioned in my previous post. Found it on Scotcat but I'm sure it's at Planet Catfish as well.

http://www.scotcat.com/articles/article70.htm

Adam

Telnes · Post by **Telnes** » Fri Jan 06, 2006 10:45 pm

I have both zebra and QA inn the same tank and it works fine, but i will seperate them when they are older.

Orion · Post by **Orion** » Fri Jan 06, 2006 10:53 pm

Thanks for the info, and wow, what an interesting article!

Well, after a little game of "Chase the Fish with a Net", I caught my L260 and determined her to actually be a He. I'm not sure if that changes anything.

I believe that the Zebras I'm getting are fairly young and only about an inch in length. (So I'm assuming they have another couple of years until they're mature? I could actually use so info on that!)

So I'm not too worried about any breeding, or at least, not for awhile. I'm good as long as I know that the Queen won't hurt the Zebras

fishboy · Post by **fishboy** » Sat Jan 07, 2006 12:31 am

How many zebras you getting

Mindy · Post by **Mindy** » Sat Jan 07, 2006 7:05 am

Orion, if they're only 1" at the moment, yes, they do have a few years before they're grown...

Orion · Post by **Orion** » Sun Jan 08, 2006 1:19 pm

fishboy: I'm getting three

Mindy: Yeah, that's what I thought. Thanks for verifying