They are notoriously hard to look after as well. They are even harder to breed as well. Hence the high price.
They are not all difficult to care for and are easy to feed. Most people who fail have usually put them into community tanks. They basically need warm well oxygenated water. And they are not any more difficult to spawn than many of the other Hypancistrus. All plecos can be finicky at times either to get started initially and/or to get restarted when they decide to stop. But what runs up the price is they take so long to reach sexual maturity and then they have very small spawns. This also makes it uneconomical to farm them in large numbers. The have also been illegal to export from Brazil as they have not been on the approved export list for a number of years.
What is now pushing up prices once again is the fact that these fish will likely become extinct in the wild in the near future due to the construction of the Belo Monte dam.
If you really want to acquire some in the UK, find breeders there. These are just three listings I was able to find on the zebra site and one UK pleco site.
Tue Jan 31, 2012 9:12 pm I have 12 F1 Zebra plecs available. They are around 1.5".
£100 each or two for £180 PH is 6.7 and they are all feeding on Tetra Prima.
Can view and collect from Reading, Berkshire or will ship next day guaranteed with FedEX
Sun Mar 25, 2012 8:58 pm I have some well reared juveniles for sale 1" plus. Pick up only from north east uk. My son is travelling up to Aberdeen on good quote]
Size between 1.5 inch to 3.5 inch,
Price: £100 and £150 based on size or might do a deal on the whole group,
Shipping/Posting?: Collection only,
Location?: Sheffield, One mile from Junc. 31 of M1. could potentially meet on motorway for the right buyer
I have been a zebraholic for some time. I can quit anytime, really I can..........
Please help me I bought two very healthy looking zebra plecs about 2cm but I've had them 7 months, and it doesn't look like they have grown any bigger my ph etc are fine and I feed them a small bit of tetra prima pellets by straw directly to there hide out, and have seen them eat it and I've now and then fed them bloodworm ( scared they might choke) the have a tank to themselves please please can anyone help I love zebras but feel I'm not doing enough on my part or are they meant to grow that slow? Thanks mark.