Baby SAE, my new favorite fish.

[ludover]

If you're not interested in this block of text below, this is the short version: SAE, keep them solo, in pairs or in groups? Other interesting little known facts about SAE?

So today I got a baby SAE from my very trusted LFS. I know the owner pretty well and she claims to be absolutely sure they're the real deal and otherwise I can bring it back anyway. The little fellow/missus is doing great. Under an inch in length it's going steady in a 64G with a lot of plants, ten very active zebra danio's, at least fifteen rasbora espei, 10 checker barbs, 8 kuhli's and 6 Oto's (and a couple bamboo and some ghost shrimp).

At the moment he's mainly on the bottom and sometimes checking out a plant, feeding all the time. He hasn't really found the BBA I hope he may tackle but he/she's super cute with those big eyes and occasionally swimming backwards. I love him/her and consider naming it once I can sex it.

At my LFS the owner told me she never had problems keeping a single SAE. But on the interwebs opinions are quite conflicted as to whether they prefer groups, pairs or solo situations. Anybody have a thought on that? Also anything else I should know?

Extra pics, my new tank, 30G currently housing 8 neon's.

 

[platytudes]

It does seem you have the real thing:
http://www.fishlore.com/aquariummagazine/may08/siamese-algae-eater-id.htm

Sexing it might be quite difficult. Females are plumper, but these fish can get awfully chubby if allowed to. Getting pairs to form would definitely be extremely hard. Since you have a planted tank, I can't imagine what it would be like removing a bunch of fish (since you'd need to get a bunch more and then remove all but the pair) and breeding is very rare.

If you like how they look and act so much that you want more, you can have more, but solo is no problem either. Depending on how much algae you have, you might want to keep your SAE as a team along with Amanos, olive nerites, and otos.

I'd go with a unisex name, like Finley