freshwater eel

Question
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Followup To
Question -
i work at a pet store and we just recieved some fish called dinosaur eels the ones we just got are quite small would you be able to tell me some stuff about them because they are really cool thanks
Answer -
Hi Zach;

It's really great that you are willing to learn about the fish. So many fish store employees are giving wrong and dangerous information to customers. I'm glad to see you won't be one of them.

The fish is called a "Senegal Bichir" also known as "Cuvier's Bichir". Their scientific name is Polypterus senegalus. They get up to a foot long, so don't recommend them for any tank smaller than 55 to 100 gallons. Not really an eel at all, they are predators and will eat any fish it can get in it's mouth....

Here are some links.

http://www.thetropicaltank.co.uk/Fishindx/poly-sen.htm
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/viewtopic.php?p=214738
http://www.aquahobby.com/gallery/gsenegalus.html
http://badmanstropicalfish.com/profiles/profile41.html

Followups welcome

At Your Service;
Chris Robbins

Come on over and join us on the freshwater fish forum at About.com to get even more information too;
http://freshaquarium.about.com/od/questionsanswers/a/naavigateforum.htm

My member name is ChrisR62. See You There!

i have a 55 gallon tank with a red devil, jewel cichlid and a jack dempsey right now i have the dempsey and devil separated because the devil has been roughing him up a lot when 1st of all what can i do from preventing this from happening and second do you think i would be able to place one of these Senegal Bichir in that tank i also have a pleco i am going to soon place in there in addition thanks for all your help

Answer
Hi Zach;

Your fish are all aggressive and terretorial cichlids so there isn't anything you can do to stop them from doing what comes naturally. In my opinion, adding a bichir to the mix would not be wise. The other fish would probably kill it before it could get established. If you separated it from the others until it grew big enough, it might work. However, the bichir may get big enough to try to eat them eventually. Yikes!

Sounds like you need more tanks.....Welcome to the addiction!

Followups welcome

At Your Service;
Chris Robbins

Come on over and join us on the freshwater fish forum at About.com to get even more information too;
http://freshaquarium.about.com/od/questionsanswers/a/naavigateforum.htm

My member name is ChrisR62. See You There!