Kindly ID this Unusual Pleco for me

[pinkertd]

BN's do not suck slime coat. A gazillion discus keepers also keep Bn's in their discus tanks without slime coat sucking issues. And hebilly is correct, otos that are starving will definitely suck slime coat!

 

[nagukush]

Hi there !

Thanks a lot for the kind reply and for caring. I was just worried because I saw him quite a few times, browsing and sucking all over my largest rope fish... He also did the same to the earthworms that I put in for my ropes... I thought he had developed a taste for the slime...

 

[pinkertd]

I'm not familiar with ropefish.....do they lay still on the bottom of the tank for a while? And how big is the pleco?

 

[GEV83]

This is a rope fish Debbi and they are bottom dwellers I would imagine if there non active for long periods of time a BN may decide to suck on them a lil.

 

[pinkertd]

That's what I was wondering, if the ropefish is inactive on the bottom, the pleco is gonna clean it as if it was a piece of driftwood. But it's not going after the slime coat, it's just cleaning things that don't move. Maybe it's not best to keep them together if that's the way it's going to go.

 

[kyryah]

On another forum I belong to, a member recently had a BN attack and kill a goldfish. The pleco was removed to a tropical tank, where it proceeded to suck the slime coat off of and kill two more fish. Saying that they will never suck on slime coats appears to be incorrect.

Kristina

 

[jpappy789]

IME a healthy BN will not do such a thing but I would not put it past a starving fish with a similar "sucker" mouth shape to attempt that...

 

[Lupin]

I've kept a female long-finned bristlenose pleco and a whiptail with my goldfish and they never bothered any of my goldfish at all. I did have one male bristlenose pleco terrorized every of my discus because they tend to trespass his territory and he would slash them through that I was shocked to see their flanks marked with white cuts.

 

[pinkertd]

kyryah I find that really, really hard to believe that a BN would outright attack and kill a goldfish then go on to kill 2 more fish. I'd be interested in reading that conversation if you want to PM me the site. Always willing to learn! BN's guarding a cave with a spawn inside will tail slap fish that get too near the cave entrance. If it's a small fish, the slap could kill it. And two mature males can get into a viscious territorial fight. I read about the fish I keep all the time, and they are the only aggression issues I've encountered. I sold bunches of BN's to discus owners/breeders where they put them into barebottom tanks to keep the glass clean with the discus and don't supplement their feedings until the BN's starve to death one by one. You would think that would be the perfect opportunity for a BN to start sucking slime coat to survive, but they didn't.

 

[emufish]

It depends on how your ropefish reacts if and when your pleco gives him a nibble. If he hates it, he'll move. They have to attach for a little while to cause damage. If you can find a favourite food, he won't eat anything he shouldn't anyway. I had a large male bristle nose and several gouramis who lived together. The BN liked eating cucumber, lettuce, algae and catfish pellets. He never bothered the fish, though he was quite a feisty character.

NB - if the ropefish becomes ill, then he may be seen as food. The only time I have seen a plec sucking on another plec was when one had died in a pet shop tank.