Going fishing in West Africa - a journal

[GaryE]

Ah, good questions.
I used breather bags.
The importation rules for Canada are radically different than the rules for the USA. They are much less bureaucratic. I printed up Canada's list of species needing veterinary evaluation, none of which were from the region I was fishing in. I wanted it to cooperate with the customs agents - to simplify their lives so they'd simplify mine. I also printed up the IUCN red list status of every species I caught - they were all clear. By giving the agents the paper back up to prove I knew what I was doing, I saved them trouble and they gave me none.
I declared the fish upon arrival - demonstrated humane packing to the customs people, and went on my way.
I had to put the fish in baggage, but in the suitcase that carried my equipment. That was because of liquid regulations in carry on - not allowed.
Survival rates? Somewhere along the way, my bag got walloped, and damaged. One bag with 4 Epiplatys were killed, I think by crushing which caused a leak. Everything else was fine.
The extreme temperatures there may have contributed to some of the fish looking rough on arrival. The fish were caught in water that pushed their limits already, and were on the edge. We were all concerned about that, as the water was above 32c in the habitats, and that's not good. I thought I'd lose more. They are rallying now, and will be fine, though my delicate Poropanchax luxopthalmus crashed out since. I didn't have many and their issue was bacterial.
We rented a hotel in Cotonou, and hired a driver with an old AWD vehicle for the week. The country is small, and the region where the fish are is smaller, so that worked. It was a rough hotel, but way more luxurious than our trip to Gabon, where we constantly changed hotels as we traveled. No one would stay in a room like that here, but there, it was okay.
Research answers the last question. We spent months reading, and working through likely drainages. In many past collecting reports, there are GPS coordinates included, which let us identify drainages. Google Earth was very useful, although we hit the one very good looking habitat (online....) that had dried up in the real world. Once we were in a likely area, we could talk with local people, who were generally helpful.
When we found the dried habitat, a passing motorcyclist stopped and told us of a lake that was all that remained of the stream system. So we asked around, and other locals took us directly to the water.
One locality, our last, was because we spotted a drying creek out the car window and decided to give it a try.

The only dwarf Cichlid in the region is a golden morph of Pelvicachromis taeniatus. The ones I brought back are beauties - it's quite a stunner. We caught a lot of Cichlids - mainly Rubicatochromis guttatus and Hemichromis fasciatus. There were some nice Thysochromis ansorgii, borderline dwarfs, and tons of large growing Coptodons and Oreochromis. I only kept the taeniatus - one of my favourite dwarf Cichlids. I don't keep larger fish, and numbers were low. I was hoping for characins and barbs too, but we didn't catch enough of the tiny ones to make it worthwhile.

I'd have welcome Phractura sp catfish, but we didn't catch many and they were a wishlist fish for a friend fishing with me.

We got catfish, characins, barbs, and a few oddballs too.

 

[anewbie]

The only dwarf Cichlid in the region is a golden morph of Pelvicachromis taeniatus. The ones I brought back are beauties - it's quite a stunner. We caught a lot of Cichlids - mainly Rubicatochromis guttatus and Hemichromis fasciatus. There were some nice Thysochromis ansorgii, borderline dwarfs, and tons of large growing Coptodons and Oreochromis. I only kept the taeniatus - one of my favourite dwarf Cichlids. I don't keep larger fish, and numbers were low. I was hoping for characins and barbs too, but we didn't catch enough of the tiny ones to make it worthwhile.

I'd have welcome Phractura sp catfish, but we didn't catch many and they were a wishlist fish for a friend fishing with me.

Just an fyi aquaticclarity (usa) has some of the p. taeniatus for sale - he posted an image on his facebook page:

Aquaticclarity

Aquaticclarity. 4,451 likes · 20 talking about this · 5 were here. The Facebook extension of www.aquaticclarity.com A place to ask questions about my fish and products

www.facebook.com

As for eye candy yes they are very nice. Unfortunately i'm pretty much out of space right now and kribs by any name is a krib (great parents extremely interesting to watch them breed and care for the young but where you find a pair you will find a million and 1. In fact it is quite amazing you don't find more of these available in pet shops given their ease of care and breeding.

 

[GaryE]

The ones at aquatic clarity are Pelvicachromis kribensis - a wonderful species but a different one. I have P taeniatus here. At one point, the two species, along with P drachenfelsi were all considered to be P taeniatus, but further research by Dr Anton Lamboj proved the Cameroon fish to be kribensis and lead to the description of drachenfelsi as a new species. The Nigeria/Benin ones turned out to be the originally described Pelvicachromis taeniatus. There are three colour morths of taeniatus - red, green and brown/gold. We got the latter, which is the Benin form, right on the far edge of their range.

The hobby screwed up its identifications early on, and the mistakes stuck around as they usually do.

I found the red form of taeniatus different to keep from P kribensis when I had them. They were slightly more demanding. They were harder than many Apistogramma, while breeding and raising P kribensis is about on par with many of the Apistos I used to breed. Pelvicachromis pulcher, the hobby's krib, is very easy although wilds are tougher to work with.

You get that "all Apistogramma are alike" or "all Pelvicachromis are alike" from a lot of hobbyists. What can you do with that? Ignore it, I guess, and enjoy the diversity.

I'm looking forward to the challenge of these guys. They should be fun. The habitat was very fascinating.

 

[anewbie]

The ones at aquatic clarity are Pelvicachromis kribensis - a wonderful species but a different one. I have P taeniatus here. At one point, the two species, along with P drachenfelsi were all considered to be P taeniatus, but further research by Dr Anton Lamboj proved the Cameroon fish to be kribensis and lead to the description of drachenfelsi as a new species. The Nigeria/Benin ones turned out to be the originally described Pelvicachromis taeniatus. There are three colour morths of taeniatus - red, green and brown/gold. We got the latter, which is the Benin form, right on the far edge of their range.

The hobby screwed up its identifications early on, and the mistakes stuck around as they usually do.

I found the red form of taeniatus different to keep from P kribensis when I had them. They were slightly more demanding. They were harder than many Apistogramma, while breeding and raising P kribensis is about on par with many of the Apistos I used to breed. Pelvicachromis pulcher, the hobby's krib, is very easy although wilds are tougher to work with.

You get that "all Apistogramma are alike" or "all Pelvicachromis are alike" from a lot of hobbyists. What can you do with that? Ignore it, I guess, and enjoy the diversity.

I'm looking forward to the challenge of these guys. They should be fun. The habitat was very fascinating.

Visually or care wise is there a big difference between the golden form of p kribensis and p. taeniatus?

Yea i am aware that some of the pelvicachromis are picker about water and care - not sure they are any worse with regards to parenting. I found kribs i owned (common ones and only one i have owned) to be much easier to breed than all species of apisto i've owend. the two big difference was the double teaming of parents keeping them safe and the lack of need for live food. Also as a bonus they bred in tap water where as all the apisto species i have require much softer water with some requiring much lower ph for successful breeding (or people claim); also they all require bbs or very fine meaty food (kribs are happy with greens i think).

The only africans i've gotten (and this is very recent) are n. transvstitus, n. teugelsi and e. lucanusi.

Of course i suppose there is much greater satisfaction going out there and catching them yourself - though in truth i would not dare to try to bring something back to usa right now as the entire process is a total mess.
--
Btw do you have pictures of your p. taeniatus ?

 

[GaryE]

There's no 'golden' form of P kribensis. There are some more golden local colour morphs though. They tend to be softwater ones, and the more difficult to breed ones in what we can call the P kribensis spectrum. There are care needs differences between the local forms. Moliwe fish can thrive in medium hard water, while the black and yellow form fish from Lobe need very soft.

P taeniatus, what I got, is much less common, except for a possibly line bred red form originally out of Nigeria. I haven't seen green or gold/brown ones in 25 years at least. I'd never seen this morph before - it's nice! It's not a rarity in nature - Benin has so few desirable species of fish that there's no export business. We just don't get these fish coming in.

The differences between taeniatus and kribensis are the usual - anatomy and genetics. As you know, it's the same as with Apistogramma species - often the difference is bones we don't see unless we take them apart.

The Pelvicachromis group are detritivores. They sift much of the same stuff as Geophagines like Apistos. I get best results with live foods - pretty well with the same diet as SA dwarfs. They can have the same water needs as touchy Apistos - P pulcher is an outlier with its adaptability to many types of water.

I may have been the first hobbyist to breed Enigmatochromis lucanusii - I had some out of the original group Oliver Lucanus found and brought back, picked up from him. Nanochromis transvestitus was one of the most interesting blackwater Cichlids I ever bred - amazing broodcare. They made 2 nests and guarded both. N teugelsi was fun to breed once the couple settled down and stopped trying to kill each other. That group of Nanochromis is a wild one to keep. When they're introduced to each other, it can create white knuckle fishkeeping. They're great.

I'm jealous. They're all fish I'd love to keep again.

Apistogramma were my entry drug into West and Central African species. I know people who went the other way, from African rainforests to American ones. Once a group of related fish catches your eye, you find so many speies to figure out...

 

[Innesfan]

My hats off to you for enduring the inhospitable climate and I-can't-imagine-what-else.

I'm intrigued by the water temps. We've often been told that because most killies seek out shaded banks and pools they prefer cooler waters and that even the savannah types prefer no more than upper 70s. What you describe you encountered is Discus-warmth.

Did you bring back any 'unidentified' species?

 

[anewbie]

There's no 'golden' form of P kribensis. There are some more golden local colour morphs though. They tend to be softwater ones, and the more difficult to breed ones in what we can call the P kribensis spectrum. There are care needs differences between the local forms. Moliwe fish can thrive in medium hard water, while the black and yellow form fish from Lobe need very soft.

P taeniatus, what I got, is much less common, except for a possibly line bred red form originally out of Nigeria. I haven't seen green or gold/brown ones in 25 years at least. I'd never seen this morph before - it's nice! It's not a rarity in nature - Benin has so few desirable species of fish that there's no export business. We just don't get these fish coming in.

I'm not sure what you are saying here - in one sentence you said there no 'golden' form of p kribensis and the next there are some golden local colour morph. Is the issue with using the term form instead of colour morph or is there something more significant being said here.

Well sometime difference between speies can extend beyond genetics into visible traits such as diet, care and behavior though here you seem to suggest it is just genetics.

aquaticlarity has had quite a few teniatus the past year or so - not sure if something has changed (he used to indicate he couldn't get them due to issue with violence and difficult to reach locations - or if people are more desperate. I do know generically at least in south american more species are reachable due to the unfortunate increase in habitat destruction (though brazil has strange contradictory rules allowing for total destruction of habitat while banning export for preservation).

One thing i would want clarification on - as far as i know most species of apisto are heavy meat eaters while kribs are quite happy with greens and this seems contradictory to your above statement. This seems to make a big difference in a heavily planted tank with regards to adding food or feed frys. Yes they might do better with live bbs or similar but they can manage much more readily without or perhaps i am missing something. I know that my kribs i did not explicitly feed the frys and had a problem that most survived.

 

[GaryE]

@anewbie - there's a basic distinction. What aquatic clarity is getting is Pelvicachromis kribensis. But my theory is that sellers stick to the old name ("taeniatus") because kribensis is also a trade name, and for a different common fish. I used to sell a lot of P kribensis when they were still called taeniatus, but once the name changed, people thought they were common kribs and the market died.
So your seller is using a wrong name for the excellent species he's selling. It creates confusion. The name kribs creates confusion. The krib is P pulcher. Cameroonian smaller Pelvicachromis are P kribensis. Nigerian and Benin fish on the Nigerian side of the Cross River are P taeniatus.

The region the most popular P kribensis morphs come from is in a state of mostly 'cold' war. Part of Cameroon was occupied by the British, and the rest by the French. The majority speaks French, and the English minority is along the Cross River, on the Cameroon side. The front line goes through Moliwe, which is where the nicest (IMHO) kribensis comes from. If you go into the English region, you may meet Islamic religious zealots and bandits, and your life wouldn't be valuable to either. So exports have dried up from there. The Cameroon government no longer controls its territory there.

Your message is odd. I suggested morphology and genetics, and mentioned water differences as distinctions. How is that just "just genetics"? You're reading too fast!

I don't know if there are behavioural differences. This time last week I hadn't caught any yet. Give me time. But I think the patterns are going to be as predictable as most Apistogramma. The S shaped female display, the broodcare - they should be consistent. What the water needs will be is to be seen. That'll be trial and error in the aquarium, though later this week I should get the data from the testing. I don't expect surprises but I'll welcome them.

Dietary needs? The literature says detritivores. Experience with P kribensis, P subocellatus, P roloffi, P sacrimontis, P pulcher and P silviae says that a more crustacean and insect based diet increases breeding and fry survival rates. Vegetable matter is important as well, but I imagine that as they sift, they catch a lot of eggs, larvae and small creatures in the substrate, like Corys or mini-eartheater Apistos do. Your experience didn't involve raising fry, and if you had worked with them for a couple of spawns or generations, I think you would have moved away from the green food argument. Sure, I include it, but I feed them as I did Apistos.

I always fed fry with targeted artemia, shot into the group. They got their greens grazing the tank.

 

[anewbie]

@anewbie - there's a basic distinction. What aquatic clarity is getting is Pelvicachromis kribensis. But my theory is that sellers stick to the old name ("taeniatus") because kribensis is also a trade name, and for a different common fish. I used to sell a lot of P kribensis when they were still called taeniatus, but once the name changed, people thought they were common kribs and the market died.
So your seller is using a wrong name for the excellent species he's selling. It creates confusion. The name kribs creates confusion. The krib is P pulcher. Cameroonian smaller Pelvicachromis are P kribensis. Nigerian and Benin fish on the Nigerian side of the Cross River are P taeniatus.

No he made it clear that the fish he is currently selling is no longer called taeniatus but in the recent past he has had a few taeniatus.
-
I'm not sure why you say my experience did not involve raising fry as my picture clearly shows the mother watching her frys and more than 60% of them reach maturity which was a big problem.

 

[GaryE]

My hats off to you for enduring the inhospitable climate and I-can't-imagine-what-else.

I'm intrigued by the water temps. We've often been told that because most killies seek out shaded banks and pools they prefer cooler waters and that even the savannah types prefer no more than upper 70s. What you describe you encountered is Discus-warmth.

Did you bring back any 'unidentified' species?

Nothing unidentified, but that's not an environment conducive to diversity the way Cameroon or Gabon is. Savannah limits fish, from what I saw.
The killie that surprised me was Chromaphyosemion biteniatum. Healthy ones from 34c water? Wow. I could see Epiplatys bifasciatus, as they are reported from hot places. We didn't find E. spilargyreuis (the unspellable fish) but it's been reported from 35c. The grahami we caught died from heat, and the togolensis seemed fine right out in the sunshine in the stream. It's a very specialized killie fauna there.

I always bred my biteniatum in summer when temps got up in the mid twenties. I knew they didn't breed much at the usual 20 I kept my other killies in. 34 really surprised me. But in every habitat, the only one that seemed to have easy to catch numbers was a small lake of E bifasciatus. All the other killies took a workout to catch, and catching six or ten specimens was an impressive result for an hour or two of fishing. I wonder if the heat was killing the numbers down. I don't have one single killie larger than half grown from there. I wonder if the low oxygen in such hot water knocks the adults off.

I expect that once the rains come, it must cool down a bit. There are woods, not really forest, but the water must spread in and get some shade.

 

[GaryE]

The mostly juvenile fish are getting into photo range. First is a surface hunting Epiplatys togolensis. I have 8 - one certain male and 2 possibles. They are about 2/3 grown.
If you look at the mouth shape, you see an egg laying mosquito's nightmare. These little fish slam their food.

We could see them before we caught them - they were in a stream about 3m wide and maybe one metre deep, but over a ledge along the edge where it eddied as the stream entered a culvert under the road. They were moving as a group of maybe 15, in a slow circular pattern, hunting at the surface.

About 5 metres away, the stream came off a low waterfall, with channels of boggy ground spreading out behind, impassably. The meadow with the streams converging on the drop was pretty, but too soft to walk on.

Even where the fish were, if you stopped moving for more than a few seconds, you would begin to sink quite deeply into the mud.

You can see the species isn't spectacular, but I think as they grow and acclimate, the male(s?) should be attractive sorts, in a low key way. Females have no colour in their fins.

 

[SammyTargo]

The mostly juvenile fish are getting into photo range. First is a surface hunting Epiplatys togolensis. I have 8 - one certain male and 2 possibles. They are about 2/3 grown.
If you look at the mouth shape, you see an egg laying mosquito's nightmare. These little fish slam their food.

We could see them before we caught them - they were in a stream about 3m wide and maybe one metre deep, but over a ledge along the edge where it eddied as the stream entered a culvert under the road. They were moving as a group of maybe 15, in a slow circular pattern, hunting at the surface.

About 5 metres away, the stream came off a low waterfall, with channels of boggy ground spreading out behind, impassably. The meadow with the streams converging on the drop was pretty, but too soft to walk on.

Even where the fish were, if you stopped moving for more than a few seconds, you would begin to sink quite deeply into the mud.

You can see the species isn't spectacular, but I think as they grow and acclimate, the male(s?) should be attractive sorts, in a low key way. Females have no colour in their fins.

Sorry, I am new to this thread. Is that a killifish? That is very cool it looks like a wild killifish.

 

[GaryE]

It is a wild killie. If you go back to the top of the thread, I was with friends collecting killies, cichlids, barbs, tetras and others in West Africa a little over a week ago.

 

[SammyTargo]

It is a wild killie. If you go back to the top of the thread, I was with friends collecting killies, cichlids, barbs, tetras and others in West Africa a little over a week ago.

Your back in Canada now? Did you need a permit to bring the fish with you?

 

[GaryE]

It's above in the thread, but no. If I were in the US, the process would have been very expensive and very bureaucratic, but in Canada and the EU, you are allowed to bring fish back if you simply declare them and have small numbers for personal use and not for sale or distribution.