Sailfin Plecos/gibbiceps Plec Help

[VickiandKev]

I currently have a 48 x 24 tank holding approximately 300L of water, massively overfiltered with an Aquapro3 external filter, a U4 and U2 internal.
My setup is mainly loaches with 3 fully grown BNs and a whole clutch of teeny babies (to be sold when big enough). I have sand substrate and lots of bogwood and planting.

I am planning to upgrade to a 6ft or 5ft tank (with double the volume of my current one) before xmas so the other day I bought a little baby sailfin pleco (only about 1-2") thinking he would grow nicely and be in a massive tank within a few months. I did know that they can get aggressive towards their own or similar looking species when older so didn't plan on any other large plecs.

BUT my friend rescued two 'common plecos' who were basically left in an abandoned flat and barely had enough (cold!) water to cover their dorsal fins. She took them home and had no choice but to them in her 2ft tank. Both of these fish are around 8" long at least so I said I would have them and they could go into our community tank as it's a more suitable size.

I picked them up last night, and very quickly realised one of these 'common plecos' was, in fact, a sailfin pleco. I've done a fair bit of looking around and he has the characteristic 'girrafe' pattern, rather than just being splotchy like the common plecos and in fact, his markings and shape match our baby sailfin exactly. The other pleco is some form of common pleco.

Obviously, this could pose a real problem as we now, inadvertantly, have two sailfin plecos in our tank. Right now baby sailfin is too small to be a threat, and common plec and sailfin have lived together for a fair while with no problems but I'm not sure what to expect.

I would really like to not have to rehome any of these guys especially as we're getting a bigger tank very soon, but wondered what people's experiences with sailfins are? Is it very obvious when they get aggressive?

I've seen BNs sparring amongst themselves so know what aggression looks like, and I do scatter feed with my fish anyway so there's no way any fish could prevent others from eating. I often feed a 'soup' of defrosted frozen food which lands all over the place to ensure everyone gets some, and I know this works as I've taken on emaciated fish that are being bullied and even though they're pushed around a bit in the tank they've got to normal weight and started growing within weeks.

Any help or advice would be appreciated

 

[england]

I also rehomed three common plecs and my huge sailfin gibbi, they got on fine in my 5/2/2 but i rehomed the other three leaving only one in the tank, they can sometimes become aggressive towards on another but i think commons and gibbi's esp when theyve matured seem to be very placid, filteration is a must, this is mine in my community


http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?showtopic=308816

 

[Liam50]

hey

just thought i would add that in my experience common plecs do get aggressive towards each other but i cannot remember when but i'm pretty sure i saw a guy post a thread were he stated that he had three fully grown plecs in one tank without much agression but tbh the tank was huge.

 

[VickiandKev]

Thanks guys for your input, I guess I should just upgrade my tank as soon as I can (to at least a 5 x 2 x 2 as our current one is 4 x 2) and keep an eye on things.
Liam - I'm really glad I didn't rehome your gibbi now as then I'd have 2 big sailfins and a little sailfin
I didn't know that one of these two guys was a sailfin until I got there and saw it late Friday night.
Could have been a recipe for disaster!

I still haven't noticed any aggression although the gibbi definitely has some fading out/stress colouration today so I think he's still very much settling in, and may not be behaving quite as normal yet.

 

[star4]

I have a 18" common and a 16-17" sailfin together in a 5 x 2 tank, the only time I get any agression promblens is when I feed bloodworm pellets, they both want to eat them all. I did have another common in with them which was about 8" but had no troubles, but I did re-home the 8" one.

 

[VickiandKev]

Nice to hear it's doable.

Unfortunately, what I didn't quite think about (stupidly) is that big plecs and little plecs don't tend to make for peace unless it's a mahooosive tank. My poor bristlies are not enjoying having some big buddies around and the big guys are generally being horrors about food. I do scatter feed along a 4ft x 1ft designated feed/viewing area (the rest is bogwood and dense plants) but these plecs just come storming out and through all of the fish trying to feed and scatter them completely. The loaches aren't so bothered but my bristlies are getting more and more tetchy about feeding time, I've noticed a few displaying at one another over a morsel of food or prime feeding place on the bottom which they never did before (never had to) and stress colouration is appearing on a few of them too

Think my friend that rescued them is going to upgrade her tank to at least a 4ft and I know she'd like to have them back once she does so hopefully my bristlies don't have this for too much longer.

Shame, because they're nice fish but the bristlies were there first so I can hardly turf them out.

 

[Haych]

unfortunately, this will happen. sailfins and commons can get VERY big, and unless brought up with each other from babies, they dont tend to get on. obviously LOADS of hidey holes help, but i had a sailfin and an albino plec (dunno if he was common) from babies together, but they still fought when bigger, so i had to rehome the albino one.