first experiences with parosphromenus

[Patrick Guhmann]

Dear Parofriends,

I bought two pairs of “P. deissneri” in march at Kölle-Zoo Ludwigshafen (Germany). The fishes were in good condition, keeped in soft and neutral water. I think they look like P. bintan. At home, I put them in an 40cm (25l) Aquarium with Limnobium, Taxiphyllum, Elodea and Myriophyllum. In the tank are two caves, so called “pearch-Iglos”, wood and leaves of beech and brown and grey gravel (diameter 1mm). Water parameters: conductivity about 35 microsiemens, pH round 6,5. After one week the Paros built an ranking and the dominant female chased the other female. The weaker female died some days later. The dominant male (the smaller one!) started breeding in the cave. Then I put bag with peat in the aquarium to lower pH (now pH is about 5,5). Until May this male breeded several times and the female defended the space around the cave against the other male. But I never spotted some juveniles. One week ago, I saw two larvae under the Limnobium plants. The next day, I searched the larvae, but they were gone (eaten?). Suddenly I recognized an subadult Paro! (1,5cm) standing under a leaf. I wonder what this little fish has eaten, because I feed the Paros normally with larvae of phantom midges (Choaboridae) and Daphnia – and only two times a week with artemia nauplies (because of problems with hydra).

This are my first experiences with paros – very interesting and NOT shy fishes. I do not have a digital camera, but in a few weeks a friend of mine will visit me and make pictures of the paros with his digital camera,so I can show you my paros soon. Perhaps one of the experts can identify them at species or maybe subspecies level.

best wishes

Patrick

[Kevin Marshall]

Hi Patrick

Baby brine shrimp is a good food for Paros of all sizes. But I am not quite sure what you mean about linking Brine shrimp with Hydra. If you are worried about brine shrimp though you could try Micro worm or Vinegar eels if you can get them.

[Patrick Guhmann]

Hi Kevin,

I am not worried about brine shrimp. But I do only feed young fishes daily with artemia, because in all my aquariums hydra increased after feeding so often brine shrimp. After I have seen the juvenile paro, I feed artemia every day and the hydra are happy too 🙂

[Peter Finke]

I have experienced this co-appearance of small green (!) Hydra spec. with Artemia-feeding too, but only now and then, quite irregularly.
If you don’t know Flubenol as a very efficient and safe remedy against that, I direct you to my message No. 231 in reply to Jacob’s problem (see American/Methods).

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