Personable fish, and those not personable

Personable fish… 1st we need to define, do they actually like me, or just begging for food ( your dog or cat may fall in the same class ) the puffers I’ve had before, were always personable, most Cichlids, the Pacu, I had 25 years ago, was very personable… then there are fish, like my Tin Foil Barbs, that will beat themselves to death bouncing off the ends of the tank, if they can see you through the glass… certainly not all Barbs are that way, but I’ve had my group for 2 years, you would think they would figure out, the food comes from me…
I don’t get to witness the happy dance, but at feeding time, when I’m milling the Bug Bites, behind the tanks, where I can’t see the fish, because of the backgrounds… Mrs. will tell me, watching from the fronts, they all know what you’re doing, they are all doing the happy dance… at that point, I don’t know if that includes the Tetras, and the Hillstream’s as well, or if it’s just the Cichlids, but I can guess, it’s not the Tin Foils???
Fish are a lot more fun, if we can pretend they like us… I do love my Tin Foils, but they are best watched from afar…

Funny, I like fish that ignore me. When I show up with food in front of my tetra tanks, they become alert, but I don't get a lot of begging. I like it when my fish assume I'm just another fish.

My Cichlids are cagey types, my barbs are tiny and mistrustful, my rainbows and tetras aren't exactly deep thinkers and my Cory types don't care. I suspect my killies don't have great distance vision, so to them, I'm just a thing like a distant cloud.

There's nothing more annoying to photograph than a fish that sees you and turns into a golden retriever by a food bowl. I kept Rosy Barbs for a long time, and they were complete goofs. Personable? You bet. And I really liked them. So I can see the appeal of the food hog fish, but my jae barbs, who dart in and out of sight are more my style now.

@GaryE … you sound like a cat guy… most cats are aloof… from a natural perspective, if the fish just act “natural” is most satisfying, to me… and hiding is one thing, beating their brains out, like the Tin Foils do, doesn’t provide me any satisfaction… the challenge there, because of the large size, is giving them a “soft” place to hide, that they won’t destroy, hard scape, is too damaging to the fish… and they even eat Java Fern, and a small Anubis disappeared, a couple weeks ago… I’m hoping the Pothos roots will continue to grow, and provide cover… they graze on them, but the Pothos appears to be winning, and they are making swimming channels through them, as the tank matures, I’m hoping that will work out for them…

I am not of the cat heresy persuasion. It's dogs all the way for me.

It's probably more my mindset of liking tiny fish. I've never liked oscars, and never wanted any large fish other than Satanoperca daemon.

My rasbora sarawakensis are personable. They're bad beggars lol

Of my fish, the "personable" ones are:
goldfish, hoplosternum punctatum, Pterygoplichthys pardalis (my common pleco), apistogramma borelli, Mikrogeophagus altispinosus. My hyphessobrycon elachys are also somewhat personable as they'll come to the glass and beg for food. I'll have to go fetch some of those videos

For now, here's the rasbora sarawakensis. Before they ate all my duckweed.

I’ve got pictures somewhere here, of my Panda Garra’s on my hand… they make it hard to work on the tank, they don’t run away, they want to see what I’m doing, and end up always getting in the way…

Video of the hyphessobrycon elachys




And @GaryE the dreaded photobomber food beggar, my Mikrogeophagus altispinosus. He is notorious for photobombing my pleco pics

Magnum Man said:

I’ve got pictures somewhere here, of my Panda Garra’s on my hand… they make it hard to work on the tank, they don’t run away, they want to see what I’m doing, and end up always getting in the way…View attachment 356564

Click to expand...

Garra are definitely up there. If my ceratogarra wasn't so well fed he'd probably go for it too. He's personable enough, but he's also a bit wary. Ceratogarra cambodgiensis is the species often used by "foot spas", but they're starved juveniles left to resort to feeding off people's dead skin instead of being provided proper food. The other species often used is garra rufa.


But they make fun and interesting pet fish a lot of personality in them