ZebraPleco.com • The complete Hypancistrus zebra resource

Hi, its Marcus here from Pleco aquatics.

While I don’t normally air mine or anyone else’s dirty laundry in public, I feel like I have no alterative due to the countless abusive emails I have received from Mr Coxon. The emails have raised many issues, some of which I would like to discuss and ask for comment on, others like my parentage are not up for question (Im not a bastard just to clarify)

1. Identification of the fish in question.
After speaking to the people who have colleted and supplied these fish they have reassured me that they are indeed L316’s colleted from the places they collect L316’s and have done for a while.
This leaves me with a problem.
As the resident experts are insistent that they are L400 I need to get it sorted. To this end I would like if possible Mr Coxon to post new pictures of the fish, 1 from the top, 1 from the side and 1 from the bottom. I would then like it if the resident experts would go through the pictures and tell me exactly what characteristics make the fish L400 and not L316. Weather this be the number of teeth, spacing of them or even the number of hairs on the fins it doesn’t matter I just want to know what it is that makes the fish L400.

2. Shipping of fish
I use the same methods that are used to ship fish to us. And have had no problem or anyone question those methods until now.
The fish are packed in a polystyrene box which has a volume of about 25lts it has extra insulation on the bottom. In the box we use a box sized poly bag which totally fills the box. During the winter the fish are packed in 10lts of water with the remainder filled with O2. During the summer the water volume is reduced to 6lts.
All of the fish ordered are shipped together in the one bag. We find that this works well and have managed to only loose 2 fish out of the last 500 or so sent out, while I don’t like loosing fish this is a very low quantity considering that we ship even when the temperature is as low as -5C.
If anyone reading this has received fish from us please let me know what you think of the way the fish were shipped. And if anyone else ships fish please can you let me know what methods you use as Im always looking for ways to improve things.

3. Customer care
While we try to please all of the people all of the time. Sometimes this is just not possible.
What we are prepared to do for Mr Coxon is for him to return the fish to ourselves. Once we have received them, we will replace them with any fish he chooses up to the value of the 3 L316’s he was sent. This offer is made regardless of the identity of the fish.
I believe this offer to be way above and beyond what I would expect from any retailer of fish. If there are others who would offer this please let me know as I would like to buy fish from them.

In closing I hope this clarifies the situation that has developed with Mr Coxon and while most things are up for debate, my parentage isn’t one of them!!

Marcus

abusive e-mails like this?

From : mark allen <[email protected]>
Sent : 11 January 2007 08:14:05
To : Andrew Coxon <[email protected]>

"how old are you?
as your acting and sounding like a 5 year old

the fish you were sent are L316, they were collected by someone who has been collecting fish in brazil for over 25 years.
please read what it says on planetcatfish about the patterns of L316 and you might just get you head out of your ar se long enough to see that the fish you have are not L400."

please dont make me out to be somekind of thug marcus, you make it sound like iv been sending you abusive hate mail. all i want is a refund or to swap the fish for something else without having to pay heafty postage charges both ways.

I would then like it if the resident experts would go through the pictures and tell me exactly what characteristics make the fish L400 and not L316. Weather this be the number of teeth, spacing of them or even the number of hairs on the fins it doesn’t matter I just want to know what it is that makes the fish L400.

Marcus as you probably know we are talking about a "L"number here which is not scientifically described, therefor this is a impossible task.
We can only judge from colour,shape and pattern especially as we have to judge from pictures.
I hope you guys can settle this dispute quickly and please don't let this end in a mud throwing competition on this forum.

Just a few things here.

Earlier in the thread there was a mention of water parameters being correct.

Assuming these are wild caught fish, I doubt if the water parameters are known from the fishes place of origin, and were they the same as in Marcus's tanks?

When buying wild fish especially, they have had at least 2 stressful journeys, possibly 3. South America, to the wholesaler, to the retailer and to the purchaser. In addition when they are kept in holding tanks, or in shop tanks, you often see 20 or 30 fish of the same species in the same tank, again leading to stress.

How sensitive these fish are, nobody knows. Guess we are lucky with L46's they seem to travel well.

Having purchased LNo's on several occasions where overnight courier has been involved some seem to travel well others do not, some of which is documented, but when dealing with the newer LNos it is not.

L255, L400 and L134 IME do not, L46, L333 and L201 do.

I guess you should expect a few losses, especially when dealing with wild fish and relatively nothing is known about them.

In addition if somebody intends to breed, asking for a pair, well IMO this is just about impossible, this site has a number of posts where there are hairy females of L46, thought to be males. Then they breed. Why shouldn't the same apply to other Hypancistrus.

In addition, if purchasing fish to start a breeding programme, all the fish should be purchased at the outset ( L46's and a few others which are unmistakeble being the exception ) as adding on at a later date is pretty difficult, as there are similar species, and variation within the species.

Take care

Dave

hi, sorry to butt in on this topic but i have also brought a l316 from marcus along with a a few other l numbers and would just like to say that i have found his customer service to be second to none and him to be very helpful with any other issues or questions i may have.
i find that he cares a lot about the fish he not only keeps but also all the ones hes sells.

I'm no expert on plecos but when i googled in l316 and found this pic -



this is the one i received from marcus-



i know that there can be different variations of this fish but i would say that these two pictures are not a million miles apart and if there was any doubt then i would be swayed with the seller as he also was sold these as l316's and he nor the importer he got them from has no reason to lie about there l numbers.

thanks