friendly eel?

[heedicus]

hello all,
is there such a thing? My brother is starting up a 100 gallon freshwater tank and wanted to keep it a community tank. He loves eels, are there any he could add into the tank?
its got a couple mollies in it right now, so he is going pretty much the docile route.
Thanks,
tren

[catjo]

Sorry, but I think most eels would make lunch of the mollies. I have a tyre track eel that is very friendly and eats dried krill and frozen beef heart from my hand. I wouldn't trust him with small fish though! Best of luck!

[dbcb314]

ive had a tire track eel and a fire eel or somethin. they lived with barbs just find, until the freakin tiger barbs went bezerk killed them. i sentenced those fish to death (my brothers tank) hahahahha

[dethjam316]

i have a tiretrack and a zig-zag that get along splendidly among the other fish in their respective tanks. both are very friendly and entertaining, and neither has ever taken out a fish, or even been suspected of such.

however, both of mine are relatively young, only about a year and a half old and 6 or 7 inches each, so this might be a precaution. they may become more predatory as they grow. most sources seem to suggest they are aggressive hunters...i have seen the opposite so far. mine are very timid around fish, only happy to stalk after blackworms, which they LOVE! in fact, they're even afraid of ghost shrimp which i assumed they would eat.

i suppose time will tell, but as of now, i'd definitely recommend adding a spiny eel to the tank. in 100g, i don't think they'd be a problem as long as they were well fed...meaning live blackworms at least once or twice a week.

[ChilDawg]

Originally posted by dbcb314
ive had a tire track eel and a fire eel or somethin. they lived with barbs just find, until the freakin tiger barbs went bezerk killed them. i sentenced those fish to death (my brothers tank) hahahahha

Will you please just leave the board now...or at least stop posting advice? You seem to need a helluvalot more before you have enough of an expertise level to actually help people. And while we're at it, grow up, will you?


Flaming over, and back to helping people:

I don't think that an eel would go well in that tank unless you're prepared to let the mollies become feeders. You *might* be able to overfeed the eel to keep it away from the mollies, but that would cause more trouble than it's worth.

[MonoSebaelover]

dbcb314- Please be careful about what you post. Many people on this board are very fond of their fish and try everything possible to help them survive in their captive domain. Several members on this board get very pissed when someone posts something like you did. It was obviously a compatibility issue and you could have returned them to the store rather than killing them. Just a warning to please be smart about what you post, cause if you keep posting the way you do, no one will care about what you say and will ignore you and your posts.
As to the issue at hand, I have not had much experience with FW Eels, but lots with SW eels. FW Eels tend to be a bit more predatory than their sw counterparts towards fish. Any Eel will eat whatever fits in their mouth. I do agree the Mollies are a meal waiting to happen. Most Eels also get 1-3ft so they can eat some pretty good size prey. I would say if you can get one of the smaller species like the Spinytail Dwarf or a Tire track. The Fire, although beautiful gets to be one of the larger eels for FW. Hope this helps.

[andruboz]

he could get a long thin bodied loach and pretend its an eel.

what about rope fish? will they kill fish bigger than their mouths? if you not stocking the tank with neon's it might work.

[ChilDawg]

I would think that they would, especially since they are related to bichirs, plus ropes are less than hardy. Treat them for flukes if you buy them, since they more than likely already have them.

[dbcb314]

first, the story...
i got a tank to put barbs in, so i put tiger barbs, gold royal barbs, and rosy barbs, 3 of each. my tank was a little dirty, so i decided that a ground feeder would probably be in order. i went to a small store (its not a huge chain like petland or petco) and saw these tire track eels. they were cool, so i asked how much they were. they werent that expensive, so i asked if i could get 2 of them. being the good fish store owner, he asked what i had in my tank. i told him and he said they would be fine. i bought them and went home. i put them in the tank, and all was jolly. for 3 weeks, everything was fine. but then, one of my eels was dead. i was like alright it happens, its just a fish. the next morning however, before i turned on my lights, i saw those stupid tiger barbs ganging up on my other eel. i had to go to school, but i decided id take care of it when i got home. too little, too late. the freakin eel was dead, and i knew exactly who had did it. my choices were this:#1 keep the killers in there and buy some more barbs and hope they quit being little punks.#2 take them back to the pet store, which would require a waste in gas (i live far out), just to take back a cheap little punk.#3 put them in my brothers tank (gold severum,green severum,rainbow cichlid,acura,headstand thing (not sure what it is, like i said, not my tank)rainbow shark,2cory cats,2rosy barbs,2giant danios,high finned blackskirt tetra)and hope they live. the tank had 2 rosy barbs, and a blackskirt tetra, so there was a decent chance they would live. if they were eaten, so be it, they were killers anyway. obviously, i choice door number three, and in the next 5hrs, they dissapeared. i guess they werent bullies anymore.

2nd, childawg
how do you know anything about my expertise level? ive just started posted on this board, because it seems the people here have some sense. but that doesnt mean i havent had fish for a while, and many different kinds of fish at that. ive had 5 fish at my house running at one time(right now four) and ive had a bunch of different fish. and no, i wont leave. i dont have to leave. just because i got pissed and got rid of fish i now hated, doesnt mean i dont know anything. maybe people want to hear what i know.

3rd, monosebaelover
it obvioulsy was a compatibility issue, and i do like fish (fond isnt the right wierd, thats sounds gay), there cool and fun to keep. but, there was no reason for those stupid fish to kill those eels. they dont even go in the midwaters the tiger barbs were in. why didnt the barbs play around with the other barbs like they usually did? why didnt they play in the bubbles like they usually did? instead they desided to kill. i didnt give them every chance to survive, but they had a chance. i could have been really mean and just flushed them down the toilet, or put them in with the africans. but, i gave them a chance, and they failed. but, at least 2,000 people did flame me. i could have been worse. it was just one.

peace

[slipknottin]

Interesting.

[ChilDawg]

Originally posted by dbcb314
2nd, childawg
how do you know anything about my expertise level? ive just started posted on this board, because it seems the people here have some sense. but that doesnt mean i havent had fish for a while, and many different kinds of fish at that. ive had 5 fish at my house running at one time(right now four) and ive had a bunch of different fish. and no, i wont leave. i dont have to leave. just because i got pissed and got rid of fish i now hated, doesnt mean i dont know anything. maybe people want to hear what i know.

Okay, then, but two statements which you have had in separate threads lead me to believe the worst. If you do have expertise, I would expect you to show some restraint and actually share it. Getting pissed off and killing barbs is not funny, none of us find it that way, and we hope that you do have something valuable to share and then share it.

I'm sorry that we got off on the wrong foot, but killing fish because you hated them strikes a nerve. Be careful in what you post, and I think that, with your alleged level of expertise, you will become well-respected here. Welcome aboard.

[slipknottin]

I believe if you had such a high level of expertise you would know that tiger barbs are pretty nippy and aggressive when kept in small groups. They are schooling fish and should be kept in groups of at least 5.

Instead of you being upset that your fish were killed you seem quite proud of it and didnt hesistate at all to tell us about how you "sentanced them to death"

[dbcb314]

chilidawg,
im not sayin im master fish guy, but could help some since ive had so many fish. you probably know a lot more than me. were cool though

slipnottin,
where did you even come from? you obviously didnt come to help the dude with the eel thing, you just came over here to flame. and, before i had tiger barbs, i didnt know much about them. so i had no expertise on them at all. i did know they nipped fins notoriously but, read that in groups of 3 or more they would bother themselves, not others. obviously i was wrong, and promptly put that book away in a shelf somewhere. and im not upset, it happened a long time ago. i added that to put spice in my post. i didnt know it would distract everyone. i didnt know people would get all pissy about it.

[slipknottin]

Originally posted by dbcb314
obviously i was wrong, and promptly put that book away in a shelf somewhere

hmm. you were wrong so you decided to take it out on three of your fish?

You didnt expect people to get pissy about you "sentancing fish to death"? You said yourself you were wrong, so why did you feel the need to kill them?


And actually I came to this thread because Chil had told me about it, i am supposed to moderate the forum after all.

Adding "spice" to your posts about the killing of fish is something none of us want to read about.

[Heady]

La la la la laaaaaaaaaaaaaa

Pizza anyone? :D

[heedicus]

well that answers that question...
thanks all i think i might hold off for a little.
t

[BBN]

I would never mix fish that fit in other fish's mouths.

[MonoSebaelover]

Chil also sent me a note to look into this, so Slip and I did. Our job is to make sure that most of the info is accurate and there is no people that have fun killing fish or think they are stupid so start posts that say so. If you go back and look at your original post from a DIFFERENT perspective then you will see where we are coming from. We didn't mean to jump you but the way you made it sound was you enjoyed watching them die. That was the impression I got and so did a couple of others. Also to further your expertise based on the questions you asked me is as follows; the reason the Barbs went after the Eels was they were easy targets just laying on the bottom and the Eels had no way of fighting back. I'm suprised they didn't try and jump out. That is generally their first option. You may have your opinions about fish and them dying but others have other opinions so please respect that. By saying (like Slip said) "sentencing fish to death" that generally ticks people off since we take these creatures out of their natural habitat and we as owners are supposed to give them the best possible care. I know I do and that is all that really matters to me. Like I said earlier, I'm sorry if it seemed like I jumped you but the way you made it sound kinda infuriated me. Plus I have had a REALLY bad day, and am very sorry if I put any of that anger towards you. I didn't mean to. I hope you stay around and learn more and more about the hobby. No one is an expert and you will get 3 different answers from 3 different people if asked the same question. Sorry again!

[dbcb314]

its cool, and im not goin anywhere. people cant chase me off, youll have to band me.

[stoneage]

You could try a rope fish, they are friendly if a bit shy. Mine is ok in a community tank though it does like to eat small thin fish like danio. Eventually even small danio will become wary and I still have a leopard danio who has avoided being eaten for 6 weeks. They wont bother anything thats too big to swallow.