[quote=”RafEg” post=5640]
As to Bill: From what I have read in other threads, you are not among those with a year long experience of low pH/EC aquaristics and the even a bit more special paros.
So please, once you have some, do keep them on their own and learn how to treat them correctly. A single-species tank is also the (almost) only option for you to participate in the breeding programme because only in such environments you have the total control.
Best wishes, Rafael[/quote]
Hi RafEg, while I do in fact have considerable and many years of keeping and breeding low pH fish (except Paros) it was never my intention to get Paros and put them in a tank with other fish. In fact, I seldom mix any fish. My intention would be to get to know these fish before I did anything other than breed them. My question was really for future use, I thought that perhaps in the future I could, in selected tanks, have a compatible fish. Like some people keep a few Boraras. But not until they have bred.
I would be extremely surprised if there is no catfish which shares the same habitat as the Paros. Getting to know our fish is extremely important, especially with such highly endangered fish, but gaining knowledge about the fish is not about the fish themselves, but what goes on in the habitat along with them. Often there is a symbiotic relationship between animals/plants etc., wouldn’t it be good to find out? We must remember – although this project isn’t about other fish – that because Paros are endangered, especially due to loss of habitat, then so are other fish. As someone who is concerned about conservation, both at home and abroad, I’m concerned for other species that are becoming endangered along with Paros. Although that will be a private concern and unlikely to encroach on this project.
While the project’s concern is primarily Parosphromenus, please, in a private capacity, think of the species that are going extinct with them.
I do appreciate the concerns you raise, and so you should, I could very well have been someone with no or little experience in keeping fish. So I do thank you for your input.
Bill