In a heavily planted 55 gallon could a warmouth, a male Missouri longear, and 2 dollar sunfish coexist? And are there any darters or madtoms that could live with them, or a chub sucker to help with algae.
Possible sunfish community
Started by
Guest_MasterJW_*
, Jun 16 2013 06:09 PM
7 replies to this topic
#2
Guest_Orangespotted_*
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Posted 16 June 2013 - 11:16 PM
Make sure the Warmouth and Longear are larger than the Dollars, since the latter can be little snots sometimes - above and beyond the usual sunfish aggression. Any madtoms too large for the sunfish to "taste test" should be fine. I'm not very familiar with the darters, although I predict that "big tough guys" like the Logperches, Fantails, Redlines, etc. would work, whatever's in your area. (...wait, I thought Tennessee had weird rules when it came to owning natives...?)
#3
Guest_Skipjack_*
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Posted 17 June 2013 - 09:25 AM
Yeah, you are screwed on laws, talk to Casper, he might steer you in the right direction.
#4
Guest_MasterJW_*
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Posted 17 June 2013 - 01:35 PM
Yeah, Tennessee has weird laws, but is it legal to sell natives in stores because my lfs regularly has channel cat fingerlings for sale?
#5
Guest_Orangespotted_*
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Posted 17 June 2013 - 06:54 PM
It has Channel Cat fingerlings? That's bizarre - could you perhaps get a picture of them on sale? I know sometimes fish stores mismark their stock, and "silver sharks" and Sun Catfish look similar to Channels when they are young. Who knows though, maybe the local hatchery found a profitable way to get rid of their extra stock! 
Edited by Orangespotted, 17 June 2013 - 06:55 PM.
#6
Guest_MasterJW_*
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Posted 17 June 2013 - 07:11 PM
Nah their channels, 3-4 inches whith black spots. They're also the only natives I've seen there.
Edited by MasterJW, 17 June 2013 - 07:24 PM.
#7
Guest_Skipjack_*
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Posted 18 June 2013 - 01:05 PM
I have seen channel catfish in my LFS. Remember though that these are hatchery raised, not wild caught.
#8
littlen
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Posted 18 June 2013 - 02:49 PM
^agreed. I worked at a tropical fish wholesale distributor for several years and we always had Channel cats coming and going. Albinos were very prominent and popular in the fishkeeping hobby, regardless of species. But the normal ones were sold as well. And I can't say we tried to hide what they were by calling them something else---other than some of the batches of pigmented juveniles were blueish in coloration, so we called them "Blue Channels".
But not to derail the convo---you could keep the larger sunnies together in that sized tank. As you'll read many times over if you search the forum, darters will eventually get picked off. I also prefer displaying sunfish and the like in a pond/lake/river type of habitat (minimal flow). Darters & shiners on the other hand, I set up a stream habitat....aka lots of flow. If you want some bottom dwellers, you might be able to get away with a juvenile bullhead. You could squeak by with a large, Margined madtom.
But not to derail the convo---you could keep the larger sunnies together in that sized tank. As you'll read many times over if you search the forum, darters will eventually get picked off. I also prefer displaying sunfish and the like in a pond/lake/river type of habitat (minimal flow). Darters & shiners on the other hand, I set up a stream habitat....aka lots of flow. If you want some bottom dwellers, you might be able to get away with a juvenile bullhead. You could squeak by with a large, Margined madtom.
Nick L.
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