Javascript Disabled Detected

You currently have javascript disabled. Several functions may not work. Please re-enable javascript to access full functionality.

Chub and stoneroller in captivity

Started by Guest_tricolor_* , Apr 27 2009 11:18 AM

Reply to this topic

17 replies to this topic

#1 Guest_tricolor_*

Guests

Posted 27 April 2009 - 11:18 AM

Do Chub and stoneroller thrive well in captivity? Do males keep their color, finnage and tubercles for long or have them reappeared yearly?

#2 Guest_BTDarters_*

Guests

Posted 28 April 2009 - 12:22 AM

Depends on what type of chub, but in general, chubs that I've had in captivity do well and acclimate to tank life quite nicely. Stonerollers, too. The stonerollers I've kept generally "calm down" in captivity and lose their tubercles. I've not yet been able to bring them back into spawning condition.

Brian

#3 Guest_CATfishTONY_*

Guests

Posted 28 April 2009 - 05:36 AM

Depends on what type of chub, but in general, chubs that I've had in captivity do well and acclimate to tank life quite nicely. Stonerollers, too. The stonerollers I've kept generally "calm down" in captivity and lose their tubercles. I've not yet been able to bring them back into spawning condition.

Brian

I had a hard time getting my stonerollers to eat.
but the creek chubs converted to any food they are eating machines.

#4 Guest_Drew_*

Guests

Posted 28 April 2009 - 09:42 AM

I've never been able to keep adult stonerollers for an extended amount of time. I'm currently keeping juveniles and one adult in my stream tank where they can graze on the algae-covered rocks all day. They stay pretty plump and don't eat much of the food offered to the other fish in the tank. The adult stoneroller got sucked up into the filter when it was smaller so it is skittish and hides pretty much all day now.

I also have a river chub now which is doing well. I had a bluehead chub but he decided to jump out of the tank.

#5 Guest_tricolor_*

Guests

Posted 28 April 2009 - 10:43 AM

Sorry, for chub I mean the daughter of the moon. IIRC many years ago I've seen male bluehead chub at the aquarium at NC making nest, so I guess they can do well in cool tanks. Did someone here had talked about other Nocomis chub making nest in the home aquarium before? What change after spawning/breeding season is over in the home aquarium?

So it sounds like stoneroller need grazing to do well in captivity?

#6 Guest_Drew_*

Guests

Posted 28 April 2009 - 12:12 PM

I think Todd had them make a nest in his tank.

The grazing seems to help the stonerollers as they are designed that way I guess. I don't think the flake/live food diet is ideal for them.

#7 Michael Wolfe

Board of Directors

North Georgia, Oconee River Drainage

Posted 28 April 2009 - 12:47 PM

Sorry, for chub I mean the daughter of the moon. IIRC many years ago I've seen male bluehead chub at the aquarium at NC making nest, so I guess they can do well in cool tanks. Did someone here had talked about other Nocomis chub making nest in the home aquarium before? What change after spawning/breeding season is over in the home aquarium?

So it sounds like stoneroller need grazing to do well in captivity?

Well my nocomis appears to be the son of the moon, as he gets a bluehead and tubercules every year about this time (have some right now in fact). I highly recommend these as aquarium fish. Although he is easily 3 times the length and 5 times the mass of any other fish in the tank, he never eats darters or shiners... he does scare everyone occasionally with some extremely fast mostion or even breaking the surface of the water to get at a particularly interesting chunk of food). I have recently notices a minor change in teh gravel archetecture, but it does not appear too purposeful at this point... may be more a result of current and the fact that he scoups up some gravel when he sucks food off of the bottom, and then spits it out in a particular spot... he might change his building technique if there was a lady or two in the aquarium to entice... but that is sadely not the case.

Easy to feed, peaceful, interesting behaviour, colorful (see my avatar), big, bold... I could go on... love my chub!

Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing. - Benjamin Franklin

#8 Guest_BTDarters_*

Guests

Posted 29 April 2009 - 02:41 AM

I have a trick that I discovered for feeding the stonerollers. Put flake food in the tank immediately before you turn off the lights at night. For some reason, the stonerollers who are shy during the day have no trouble feeding in the dark. Strange, but it's worked for me.

Brian

Brian J. Torreano - Owner
BTDarters
American Native Fish for
your aquarium...and more!
Web: http://www.btdarters.com
Email: bt@btdarters.com
Phone: (262) 268-7489

#9 Guest_smbass_*

Guests

Posted 29 April 2009 - 10:40 PM

Veggie flakes work well for stonerollers. I will second the notion that Nocomis chubs are great aquarium fish. I have personally kept 3 different species and they will get breeding turbicles each year for a short time in the aquarium. I currently have a pair of bluehead chubs and 2 very small hornyhead chubs. I have kept river chub in the past as well.

#10 Guest_tricolor_*

Guests

Posted 30 April 2009 - 11:37 AM

Thanks. Do male keep their color after the spawning season is over in the aquarium even after tubercles are lost?

#11 Guest_Kanus_*

Guests

Posted 30 April 2009 - 12:44 PM

I haven't had any luck with stonerollers getting excited, but about mid November I caught a nice male bluehead about 6 inches long. Took very well to aquarium life, and got real excited in about
February. Fully tuberculate, yellowish fins, blue head, and he did indeed build a nest. That went on for about 2-3 weeks and he stopped maintaining his nest and the gravel redistributed a bit. It looked like his tubercles shrank (I was under the impression that they fell off completely?). After about two more weeks his tubercles became enlarged (someone please tell me if you know more about the tuberculation process, I could have imagined it) and he rebuilt his nest. Over the course of him being in there the temp has been between 72 in the winter to a high of 82 the other day. Ever since, though, he has been happily maintaining his nest and, oddly, sparring with a nuptial male Satinfin shiner I have with him.
Also, about 3 weeks ago I added a large gravid female chub from the same stream hoping to get some action going (I had just recieved some yellowfin shiners that looked about in spawning condition, was hoping to get them to spawn over the nest) So far he is still keeping his nest up but neither the female nor anyone else in the tank has gotten excited about it.

They really are cool fish, moreso than I had imagined. Back when I first put the male in, he actually grabbed a stem of anacharis, broke off about 3 inches of it, and swallowed it whole (which took him a few hours of swimming around with it. On the downside, I have seen him nail smaller fish now and then, and I think he may be responsible for my declining population of roanoke darters.

#12 Michael Wolfe

Board of Directors

North Georgia, Oconee River Drainage

Posted 30 April 2009 - 04:16 PM

Tricolor - My bluehead keeps his blue head year round... brighter when he is feeling it in the spring time and tuberculates up and more of a steel blue in the winter.

Kanus - Have you actually see him hit a another fish? That would be odd to me, I have never seen that behaviour in any of my blueheads. They don't eat other fish as far as I know. But I assume that they would chase darters away from eating eggs. On the issue with the satinfin... normal nest cohabitators are things like dace and notropis shiners... Cyprinella are crevice spawners, so I wonder if they are getting too far down in the stones and making the chub uncomfortable? This could casue the sparing activity you are seeing... very interesting...

Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing. - Benjamin Franklin

#13 Guest_Kanus_*

Guests

Posted 30 April 2009 - 04:29 PM

Kanus - Have you actually see him hit a another fish? That would be odd to me, I have never seen that behaviour in any of my blueheads. They don't eat other fish as far as I know. But I assume that they would chase darters away from eating eggs. On the issue with the satinfin... normal nest cohabitators are things like dace and notropis shiners... Cyprinella are crevice spawners, so I wonder if they are getting too far down in the stones and making the chub uncomfortable? This could casue the sparing activity you are seeing... very interesting...

I haven't seen him actually catch a fish but I have seen him once or twice with a tail sticking out of his mouth.
As far as the Satinfin goes, the satinfin seems to be the aggressor in most instances, as the way I have it set up is there is a rockpile in front of a high flow maxi-jet mod, where the satinfin has been spawning off and on for the past six months. Directly behind that, within about 8 inches of his nesting site is where the chub decided to build his nest. I'm pretty sure the satinfin is just defending his usual ~1 foot radius of his nesting site, but while sparring, they both flare fins, arch bodies toward one another and swim in circles as if they were conspecifics, though I must admit, for being twice his size, the chub always swims away. I guess I wouldn't wanna take on a cyprinella either though.

#14 Guest_andyavram_*

Guests

Posted 01 May 2009 - 12:19 PM

I had a Stoneroller that ate anything and everything I put in the tank, but it never grazed algae. He accidentially got trapped in part of the tank and died because of that. I now have two more, a male and female and they are a little more picky but will eat anything I give them, along with grazing algae.

Andy

#15 Guest_tricolor_*

Guests

Posted 06 May 2009 - 11:44 AM

Thanks everyone. Sound like stoneroller in many case is not easy to keep, and none so far becomes tuberculated in the home aquarium.

For Blue head chub does thae red fin coloration of young southern ones disappear with age/size?

#16 Guest_smbass_*

Guests

Posted 06 May 2009 - 12:12 PM

Mine are relatively large (4-5 inches but I know they can double that) and still have the red.

#17 Michael Wolfe

Board of Directors

North Georgia, Oconee River Drainage

Posted 06 May 2009 - 04:01 PM

Thanks everyone. Sound like stoneroller in many case is not easy to keep, and none so far becomes tuberculated in the home aquarium.

For Blue head chub does thae red fin coloration of young southern ones disappear with age/size?

In my case / experience with individuals from around North GA and SC I would say that they do lose the orange fin coloration... but by that time you have a big bold brassy looking fish with a bright blue head... so whatta ya want for nothing? And I'm not really disagreeing with anyone at the 4-5 inch range wild caught fish ... I'm talking about 7-8 inches that started out as a 3 inch minnow (with orangish fins) and grew up in a tank over the last several years.

Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing. - Benjamin Franklin

#18 Guest_tricolor_*

Guests

Posted 06 May 2009 - 04:11 PM

While I went to mid-south AL I remembered that juvenille blueheads have pretty reddish fins. So basically both the west and east are quite the same [minus tubercles] as adult?