Butterfly Goodeids?

[Eines]

I'm considering buying some butterfly goodeids and I was wondering if anyone has heard of them and if they could give me some tips. I haven't even checked if my LFS even sells them, right now, I'm just starting to do some research to see if they would be appropriate for my aquarium. The couple questions I've come up with so far: does one need to keep them in the same 1:2 male to female ratio as other livebearers? and do they get along with most other species, in my case, angelfish and swordtails? There does not seem to be much info on them, so any help would be appriciated.

 

[nmonks]

Ameca splendens are very pretty fish.

However, they are nippy fish. Mine certainly went at things like Corydoras without a moment's pause. They currently live with loaches, a Garra, various puffers, and some secretive catfish. Seems to work fine like that. Angelfish and likely swordtails would be poor choices for tankmates.

The males are fairly aggressive towards one another, and I would certainly recommend the usual two females per male ration when keeping them. It takes a while for their full colours to develop, by the way, so be careful when choosing the males and females at the pet shop.

All in all, a very nice species, and I'm actively hunting for some more to boost the size of the group; I'm quite taken with them! They're different to common livebearers in being rather more feisty and subtly coloured.

Cheers, Neale

 

[helterskelter]

http/www.goodeiden.de/

These are real interesting fish, the females feed the fry like mammals do. Where as common livebearers do not.
After any broods of fry the females then has to mate again as they do not store packets of sperm either.

Yes they are notoriously nippy and I only ever kept them in species tanks. So cant suggest what to keep them with.

Their is a German livebearer group called the DGLZ if you search I'm sure they have a site, the only one i could see was about 3 years out of date.

 

[Eines]

thanks for all the great tips guys! It's a shame that they're such nippers. I probably won't be able to keep them with my angels then.

 

[OldMan47]

They are delightful fish in an unheated tank of a decent size. I keep mine in a single species tank, as I do all of my goodeids. Mine is a heavily planted tank and I find the Amecas do fine with the adult fish and fry living together in a simple colony situation. The females take about 2 months to deliver fry but the fry are quite large compared to the more common livebearer fry. I have not had any trouble with intraspecifc aggression but these guys have a reputation for being a bit rough compared to most common livebearers. Ay one time, there was an attempt to sell them as algae eaters but it didn't turn out so well because they were too nippy. Here is a picture of my sub-adult fish. It is the only ones that I have a decent picture of.

 

[Jonathangerous]

Probably because you have them in a colonial setting.

 

[OldMan47]

More a question of picture taking skills Jonathangerous. Its is not a question of the adults or younger fish not being present, these guys were near the glass the last time I went on a picture taking binge. You know when you snap 6 pictures in this tank and 10 in the next and so on for an hour or two.

 

[Jonathangerous]

I meant the lack of extreme conspecific aggression in your fish is probably because they are housed in a colony--as they should be.