Congo Killies - PageSuite

when it comes to caves. Except at
spawning time, no individual has
its own cave, as my Ancistrus L
144 do, for example. The females
drive the males out of any cave if
it suits them—they are larger and
more able to look after themselves.
Triangular-shaped pipes
are particular favorites, probably
because they are a good fit for
the fish’s body shape. Bogwood
seems to provide no particular
attraction for Ancistrus claro. In
this respect they are significantly
different from other Ancistrus
(for example, Ancistrus sp. “Río
Paraguay”, L 107).
I now feed my Ancistrus claro
a less vegetarian diet than I use
for other Ancistrus species—food
tablets are noticeably more
popular than spinach, for example. Cucumber,
zucchini, and potato are more or less completely
ignored. The temperature fluctuates between 73
and 79°F (23–26°C), as the heating is controlled
by the same time switch as the light. A friend kept
his specimens at 84°F (29°C). He said that these
conditions were suggested in the original description,
but now he has no fish left. It would seem
that not all L-number catfishes like the conditions
required by Hypancistrus.
After a year of maintenance, when my fish were
almost two years old, I discovered the first clutch.
There were fewer than 20 eggs, but they were very
large, approaching 4 mm in diameter. The clutch
wasn’t like a bunch of grapes—the eggs were distributed
next to one another in a patch on the ceiling
of one of the triangular clay pipes. No egg was attached
on top of the others.
The brooding male lay outside the pipe with
only his head inside, continually fanning water
inside with his fins. I have now observed this behavior in
both males during 10 different spawnings. There was no
change, even when both males were brooding clutches
simultaneously and in sight of one another.
Unfortunately, I lost two clutches because, while I
was away for a few days, the filter had become so clogged
that the diffuser no longer created an air supply. The male
apparently couldn’t compensate for this and the entire
clutch failed to hatch. It appears that the oxygen requirement
is very high, which moved me to set the maintenance
temperature permanently to around 75–77°F
(24–25°C). Of course it sometimes rises to as warm as
86°F (30°C) in the height of summer, but so far all my
fish species have withstood this well in the short term.
After just two days the eggs darkened considerably
Fry of Ancistrus claro with
residual yolk sacs.
Half-grown Ancistrus claro
still exhibits a pattern of
spots on the dark body.
and became almost opaque. After four days the eyes
could be seen in the eggs, but hatching didn’t take place
until the ninth day. From above, the freshly hatched
larvae appeared banded and were very large at around .5
inch (13 mm) in length. With increasing age the young
develop a white spot pattern, which may not be a match
for the other white-spotted species (e.g., L 107) but still
looks quite attractive.
On one point I have to agree with the literature: the
young grow very, very slowly. That is also the main reason
why this species is only rarely available in the trade. Sometimes
you have to travel a bit further to the breeder.
REFERENCES
Seidel, I. 2008. Back to Nature—Handbuch für L-Welse. Ettlingen.
AMAZONAS
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