Plecostomus expert care solutions:Illnesses,Habitat and more

Are Plecostomus right for your aquarium? 

The plecostomus fishes are tropical freshwater fishes, and also suitable for your aquarium. These fishes can resist the conditions of any aquarium.Even you can add them to a populated community of fishes. There are also few benefits that avail you get rid of cleaning aquariums, because plecostomus fishes are algae eaters, eats the algae with their sucker mouth at the faces and edges of your aquarium. 

If you want to have Plecostomus species as your companion, it's necessary to know the detail information about this species. It's quite obvious to protect and care your plecostomus, so make sure to know its habitat, behaviour, tank mates, feeding and breeding, before you join them as your companion. 

In this article you are going to learn every unique detailed info about a special species of tropical freshwater. After all you can  make these fishes safe and secure without any guide. No further doubts will arise into your mind when you finish this whole article. 

Let's into more detail.... 

Classification of Plecostomus

The  Plecostomus are belongs to Loricariidae with genus hypostomus. This fishes are also known as sucker mouth catfish.Loricarridae family species are listed as a group of cat fishes, which also includes hypostomus plecostomus. The reason behind naming this species a sucker mouth catfish is its sucking mouth, helps keeping sticked to rocks and caves in fast travelling rivers and streams. The sucking mouth of these fishes mainly provide enormous amount of food when they sucks into their metabolism. 

These species are found in the region of northeastern South America, the northern Brazil, Guyana, French Guiana and Trinidad and Tobago are some of the states of the specific region. The freshwater rivers Orinoco, Rio caroni,San Marcous,San Felipe and Rio Grande are rich source of Plecostomus fishes, the areas in the route of these rivers found them most likely. 

Typically these fishes are reported with wrong names in other countries where they distributed, because of the similar scientific name and appearance. These species are categories into 150 different varieties under Hypostomus Plecostomus, so be appropriate when you go for a purchase. 

How do they look? 

The Plecostomus fishes are appear with a abnormal body representation, because the fins and tail around their body are extra large in size like armored type. So they are also called as armored catfishes.

These fishes are covered with lots of dark brownish or black spots and living very minute gaps for white colouration.

The structural appearance of their body  becomes elongated as they grow older. The dorsal fin of these fishes are extra larger with scute and arranged in a longitudinal row. The pectoral and pelvic fins are appears to be more wider which helps them to travel faster during any hazardous situation. The anal fin of this species are very wider in area to help them in  more stabilising. 

How long do they grow? 

The size of the Plecostomus literally depends on the environment it lives in. The area it requires to grow full pledged should be undoubtedly the rivers and canals. The maximum length that a Plecostomus can grow is about 24 inches. But in aquarium it hardly grows around 10-12 inches, it's purely because of the space they occupies during their survival. It takes around more than 2 years to grow in a complete size. 

How to differentiate gender? 

The plecos gender can be determined by their size, shape and fins size. The pectoral fins of males are extends beyond their range of existence and attaches the edges of their mouth, this feature is uncommon to the female version of this species. 

The size of the females are larger than males, where as males are appears to be lean in structure. The shape of the female fishes are more rounded unlike the male fishes. The abdominal of females are larger which relates their body structure. 

Lifespan

The lifespan of Plecostomus are no longer than 11 years. The fishes in aquarium finds difficult live for 8-10 years. If you don't take better care for them, it's hardly for them to survive less than 6 years. So be careful while you run a aquarium as a beginners , because many factors are 

included in it. 

Habitat & parameters of tank

The Plecostomus species is a tropical freshwater addict, which normally attracts to warm weather conditions.The natural habitat of these species are the fast moving rivers. They are also survives in brackish water. They can adopting themselves since ages to survive in small water bodies. They are also capable of breathing through skin, they derived this feature from their ancestors as they lives in the tropical climate. 

The parameters of their natural habitat includes the acidity of the water around 6.5 pH to 8.0 pH. The tropical temperature of the water  is around 22°C - 32°C.The hardness of the water is less than 10 mg/l. 

If you wanted to have plecos as your companion, then you need to have some parameters and elements that should be added to your basic aquarium. Follow the steps that are mentioned below:

The size of aquarium for a regular plecos should be more than 55 gallons, I personally recommend having a Plecostomus with larger community of fishes is a good choice as a beginner. 

• The first step you need to do is to have a aquarium set up about 80 gallons to keep your pleco more space to occupy happiness and activeness. 
• Add some elements to your tank includes some rocks, live and floating plants, caves, gravels and cervices to give more hiding places for them to settle. 
• The acidity of the water should be around 6.5 pH to 8.0 pH to match their natural habitat. 
• The hardness of the water should be about less than 10 mg/l to create the river water hardness to keep body adjust to the aquarium conditions. 
• The temperature of the water should be maintained from 22°C to 32°C to attain the temperature of tropical climate. 
• Add a powerful filters to give a fast moving river effect to the aquarium. 

Behaviour of plecostomus

The virtual behaviour of a Plecostomus is obviously shy and finding  better places to hide in the tank. Most of the time they hide themselves in the plants and caves of the aquarium. The reason for this is every fish when you bring them as a new to your community, they feel shy to come out. When they start their growth slowly they introduces to the aquarium. 

These fishes are known as tank cleaners  because they just go on searching any algae or food at the bottom and corners of the tank,when they find some then they suck with their sucking like mouth. 

You'll find them eating plants, insects in the tank.

Tank mates of plecostomus

The Plecostomus species are not that aggressive and manages to stay with fishes that don't occupy their spaces. The plecos won't tolerate with most of other plecos, so it's better to have other than these companions as their tank mates. The better choice is keep these fishes with some smaller fishes can help them find their own way to get calm. 

The most of gourami fishes includes paradise gourami, sunset gourami,pearl gourami, samurai gourami and snakeskin gourami are best options to have as tank mates because these are small fishes which can be tolerated by plecos. 

The guppies, loaches like kuhli loaches, cichlids includes Jack Dempsey cichlid elctric blue cichlid, convict cichlid and cockatoo cichlid, angelfish, barbs, bettas includes neon tetra,hatchets mollies and platies.

Illnesses & cure

The Plecostomus species are commonly infected by some parasites, bacterias , viruses and fungal. The most commonly occuring diseases are Ich or white spot disease, Piscine tuberculosis and Fin Rot. 

The treatment for these are pretty easy, if we know to which part of the body do these diseases will infect. So let us know more about the commonly occuring disease Ich, it's caused by Ichthyophthirius multifiliis parasite which effects their skin. The symptoms are appears as white spots on their body. To cure this disease, slightly raise the temperature of the water and use regular medications. It's quite common all other fishes. 

The other disease that effects the health of Plecostomus is the Piscine tuberculosis which is caused by Mycobacterium marinum bacteria. This disease infects the liver and spleen of these fishes and spreads all over the body. The symptoms of this disease are loss in appetite, weight loss in under parts, bulging in eyes and discolouration of their skin. Amputation process is a better treatment to cure this disease. 

Fin Rot disease occurs because of the bacterial infection. The symptoms of this disease are appears at their fins, the erosion in their fins. The treatment to cure this disease is to improve quality of water and feed these fishes with vitamin-C food.

Be careful when these fishes get infected with these diseases, because they may spread to all other fishes in the aquarium. So separate these infected fishes and add in other aquarium before you medicate them. Replace the water after every consecutive medication. 

Plecostomus Diet 

The Plecostomus species are omnivores, so they prefers to eat plants and algae mostly. The Plecostomus are well known algae eaters, always finds themselves eating algae at the bottom of the tank. The algae found in the aquarium is quite low in quantity, so it's better to have algae tablets which sinks to the bottom and makes easier to find for plecos. 

The plecos are also capable of eating vegetables, you can provide vegetables, leafy vegetables. They can have earth worms, shrimps, blood worms and plants as their live foods. It can be fed with freeze- dried blood worms.Insects are great food for plecos. 

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