A Big Eating Machine Is Know A Little Machine.

[M.R Otter]

Howdy fellas!! few hours ago a friend of mine had gave me this wierd looking fishes that he told they are called the Red Snakehead, he gave me these fishes as a present, but I don't know whats the occasion. I would like to know some info about them. they realy hard to feed they don't eat flake, tablets, pellets what do guys think, but they did attacked a 4cm long common pleco.

 

[mixmaster jay]

we need to see pics really mate to determin what species it actually is

 

[nmonks]

Assuming this isn't a wind-up, and honestly, your message is written just like one...

The Red Snakehead is Channa micropeltes. This species is amongst the worst aquarium fish in the world. The main problem is that they will, repeat will, get to about a metre in length. They *do not* grow to the size of their tank. This is why they're good food fish: you can pack 'em into the pond, and they'll still grow, assuming diet and water quality allow.

Snakeheads are generally not difficult to feed, but they don't have much interest in dried foods. You need to be offering juveniles things like earthworms and river shrimps, and adults should be weaned onto beefheart, frozen seafood, and small frozen fish such as lancefish. As always with predatory fish, you need to choose food carefully to avoid fat and especially thiaminase (which is in things like shrimps and mussels, and long term, causes problems).

They are red only when small. Adults are more mottled blue-grey. It is considered a destructive and invasive pest fish in some parts of the world, and consequently banned from the aquarium trade, e.g., in California, Florida.

When I was a teenager these fish were rather widely sold. Thankfully, they are now rarely seen in British aquarium shops.

Cheers, Neale

 

[M.R Otter]

Assuming this isn't a wind-up, and honestly, your message is written just like one...

The Red Snakehead is Channa micropeltes. This species is amongst the worst aquarium fish in the world. The main problem is that they will, repeat will, get to about a metre in length. They *do not* grow to the size of their tank. This is why they're good food fish: you can pack 'em into the pond, and they'll still grow, assuming diet and water quality allow.

Snakeheads are generally not difficult to feed, but they don't have much interest in dried foods. You need to be offering juveniles things like earthworms and river shrimps, and adults should be weaned onto beefheart, frozen seafood, and small frozen fish such as lancefish. As always with predatory fish, you need to choose food carefully to avoid fat and especially thiaminase (which is in things like shrimps and mussels, and long term, causes problems).

They are red only when small. Adults are more mottled blue-grey. It is considered a destructive and invasive pest fish in some parts of the world, and consequently banned from the aquarium trade, e.g., in California, Florida.

When I was a teenager these fish were rather widely sold. Thankfully, they are now rarely seen in British aquarium shops.

Cheers, Neale

HUH?! what do you mean by wind-up? you don't actually mean that I made all that up do you? I can prove that I have them and I will post some pics on them now please wait..........by the way that is a great info.

 

[M.R Otter]

Here is my snake head pic

the one on the left is mickey and the one on the right is sly!!

 

[nmonks]

Sorry, didn't mean to offend. I just didn't think anyone would really fall for the "oh, it's a cute snakehead" thing anymore. I honestly believed (hoped, prayed) nobody buys these fish nowadays. They are insanely large fish, and simply don't work as pets. It's not that they aren't hardy and rather handsome fish, but their size and aggression simply makes them nonviable in anything but public aquaria.

Cheers, Neale

 

[simonas]

HUH?! what do you mean by wind-up? you don't actually mean that I made all that up do you? I can prove that I have them and I will post some pics on them now please wait..........by the way that is a great info.
[/quote]

to be fair I thought the same

Seriously these are not good aquarium fish and I would ask your mate to return them to the shop he bought them
They grow extremely fast and they may look pretty now... they won;t soon!!!

plus if you on;y got them a few hors ago don;t be surprised if they don;t eat they would needto settle but as a channa keeper you will soon find you have no problem feeding!!!!

 

[england]

Agreed with the lad's..unless you can provide a tank of 8ft+/3-4ft/3ft then you will have problem's......I know of a keeper in london who has a group of four but has three 8foot tanks in waiting and is also building a large tropical pond,

I have a Channa marulius in my tank, which i got from a friend, three in fact, the fish shop sold them to him as dwarf channa....so instead of him taking them back and someone else buying them as dwarf's i took them, I have rehomed one to a member on here who is proving it with a large tropical pond very soon, also the two left had a rucus leading to the death of one, now i have one left, which the lady in london said she will take it, however if not iam in contact with my local aqaurium at Bournemouth as to wether they would like to take it off my hands providing they have space, Basically iam working my behind of to rehome it correctly, Luckily as Neale stated, there less common now,but still do pop up from time to time....

A few of us know of a channa argus which has popped up on the scene which someone is trying to rehome for a friend's fish shop, however the argus you need a special license to be able to keep in your property..which i only know of four people who have this licence, two of them are in scotland...

 

[M.R Otter]

Agreed with the lad's..unless you can provide a tank of 8ft+/3-4ft/3ft then you will have problem's......I know of a keeper in london who has a group of four but has three 8foot tanks in waiting and is also building a large tropical pond,

I have a Channa marulius in my tank, which i got from a friend, three in fact, the fish shop sold them to him as dwarf channa....so instead of him taking them back and someone else buying them as dwarf's i took them, I have rehomed one to a member on here who is proving it with a large tropical pond very soon, also the two left had a rucus leading to the death of one, now i have one left, which the lady in london said she will take it, however if not iam in contact with my local aqaurium at Bournemouth as to wether they would like to take it off my hands providing they have space, Basically iam working my behind of to rehome it correctly, Luckily as Neale stated, there less common now,but still do pop up from time to time....

A few of us know of a channa argus which has popped up on the scene which someone is trying to rehome for a friend's fish shop, however the argus you need a special license to be able to keep in your property..which i only know of four people who have this licence, two of them are in scotland...

Getting a bigger tank is not a problem. I will keep them in the 310 gallon tank with oscars, JDs, walking catfish, zebra pleco.

 

[indigoj]

Bye Bye other fish then - BTW, wouldn't keep a zebra plec with ANY of those fish, it'd last 5 minutes if that.

 

[M.R Otter]

Bye Bye other fish then - BTW, wouldn't keep a zebra plec with ANY of those fish, it'd last 5 minutes if that.

huh, why??the zebra pleco is been there for weeks now and it's acting normal, all of the other fishes don't pay attention to the zebra pleco..... they are just ignoring it as if he dosn't even exist. well then I think that I will transffer the snake heads into the pond (kois and goldfishes are had got to live in a pond in the other side of the garden), the empty pond is maybe 7-12 meters long and 3 meters deep, is this pond big enogh?

 

[simonas]

Bye Bye other fish then - BTW, wouldn't keep a zebra plec with ANY of those fish, it'd last 5 minutes if that.

huh, why??the zebra pleco is been there for weeks now and it's acting normal, all of the other fishes don't pay attention to the zebra pleco..... they are just ignoring it as if he dosn't even exist. well then I think that I will transffer the snake heads into the pond (kois and goldfishes are had got to live in a pond in the other side of the garden), the empty pond is maybe 7-12 meters long and 3 meters deep, is this pond big enogh?

are you in the UKand is the pond outdoors?

 

[M.R Otter]

Bye Bye other fish then - BTW, wouldn't keep a zebra plec with ANY of those fish, it'd last 5 minutes if that.

huh, why??the zebra pleco is been there for weeks now and it's acting normal, all of the other fishes don't pay attention to the zebra pleco..... they are just ignoring it as if he dosn't even exist. well then I think that I will transffer the snake heads into the pond (kois and goldfishes are had got to live in a pond in the other side of the garden), the empty pond is maybe 7-12 meters long and 3 meters deep, is this pond big enogh?

are you in the UKand is the pond outdoors?

umm..... no I'm not from the UK i'm from the UAE, and yes......DAH the pond is in outdoors.

 

[england]

Oh well you have some good wether over there, just make sure the pond is not near any water ways and best to cover and make sure they cant escape, they can jump very very well indead, you do not want them loose in your waterways...

 

[nmonks]

Yes, this pond should be fine. There's a good literature on cultivating (for food) snakeheads outdoors. You probably won't hear much sensible about that topic on a fishkeeping forum, but if you peruse some of the tropical aquaculture sites, you should get some useful information.

Now, you will need to check the legal situation in your country. Several countries have laws restricting maintenance of these fish. The problem with snakeheads is that they are [a] predatory and adaptable, and they have the potential to be a serious pest. Things like flash floods can allow fish to get out of seemingly secure ponds into the wild. Being an air-breathing fish, snakeheads are perhaps better at surviving such journeys than other fish. Since they can and do jump, you want the pond to have some sort of mesh over it, so that the snakehead can't get out. Under a hot sun, it will die from exposure very quickly, regardless of its ability to breathe air.

You cannot mix these snakeheads with any other fish. They can be territorial in captivity (though wild fish are somewhat gregarious) and are certainly very predatory.

Cheers, Neale

the empty pond is maybe 7-12 meters long and 3 meters deep, is this pond big enogh?