Zebra Ottos

[mildew]

Anybody have any expierence keeping these?

 

[Gankutsuou]

I have never personally even seen these in person.

But if I may, I'll direct you to one of out other members. "Liam"

Send a PM to Lima, and I'm sure that he'll be happy to direct some info on it as an owner.

edit: sorry for putting you up front lima. but you're the only person I've ever seen post a pic of a zebra oto.

 

[FroggFrogg]

I'v had experience, a bad experience might i add. I bought 3 for £21 and subsequentley killed them all when i messed up my water. They are quite hard to come by round my way so i wasn't best pleased to have killd them all. They are pretty though!

 

[smithrc]

Gank. Please stop singleing out members. with so many people on here just because you only know of one person really dosnt mean others dont have valuable information to offer.

We've had both normal ottos and zebra ottos. and wont have any again. I'm an experienced keeper with many other 'sensative' fish. but ottos are something that i have never had success with - we had 8 of each and in both cases they never lasted more than a few months

This was acouple of years back and i keep getting tempted to try again - but the price really isnt worth the risk in my opinion.

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

Oto's do best when there's plenty of algae growing in the tank. They are difficult fish to acclimatise because so many are very underweight or starved by the time they arive in the petshops, many cannot cope with having to settle into another new tank.
But if you have lots of fresh algae, the oto's will start to eat it soon after arrival and if you can help fatten them up, then they'll do a lot better and your chances of keeping them alive past the first couple of months will be greatly increased. They can actually turn out to be quite hardy little fish in my experience once you have them in good health and in a stable tank for many months- having lots of planting will help too as they will spend quite a lot of their time on plants.
Never seen zebra oto's, but i have kept the normal standard oto's for over a year now with a lot of success. I have had oto's die on me in the past, but these were only ones i had kept for a couple of weeks and were very thin.

 

[mildew]

They seem to quite happy and feeding well, will have see how they go!

Many thanks everyone

Rick

 

[Liam]

I have 7 (lLiam that Gan was referring to) have had them since April, they are doing fine a few had some kind of skin problem which looked quite bad but cleared up by itself. Much the same as keeping the other ottos, they get a bit bigger. I give them slices of raw potato, cabbage, brocolli, sprouts, green beans and once a week they get mussels, they also eat frozen blood worms sometimes. They come for the mussels so fast that I dont think they can be fully vegetarian. They rarely seem to eat algae wafers. Its hard to find info on them, but so far so good, great little fish, I am very fond of them.

 

[Gankutsuou]

Gank. Please stop singleing out members. with so many people on here just because you only know of one person really dosnt mean others dont have valuable information to offer.

We've had both normal ottos and zebra ottos. and wont have any again. I'm an experienced keeper with many other 'sensative' fish. but ottos are something that i have never had success with - we had 8 of each and in both cases they never lasted more than a few months

This was acouple of years back and i keep getting tempted to try again - but the price really isnt worth the risk in my opinion.

Hmmmm. sorry if I offended by pointing out a single person, but that person had just posted one of the pics that very day, and I had no intention of saying other people didn't have value in information. I just ment to say that he could pm that person probably.

Sorry for my assumptions, but it was with good intentions. And you make it sound like I do that regularly. I believe that's only the first or second time I've done that.... And If I do do it often, then I haven't realized it and it's my mistake. But it was with good intentions and an attempt to steer him in a direction of information. And that was the first time I've even heard of zebra otos, so of course that's the only person that I knew to have them.

edit: and I don't see in any way that I made it sound like no one had nothing of value to offer. I just tried to get the quickest possible answers to his question. I don't really even see how that could be warped into "No one else has anything to say." I'd never rely on just one source of information myself. That's why I come here.

 

[summerdragon]

I haven't found any zebra ottos myself (so jealous you found some) I love my ottos!!!!!! I have found they love to have friends, plants, and stable water conditions.... I personally do very small water changes often, and have a very well filtered tank.... I’ve have mine for 6-7 months now... They are chubby little eating machines.. I have no pleco and my three ottos keep my glass looking great all the time.... But beware of getting too many as they can starve..... I MY OTTOS...

 

[Steve Adams]

smithrc,

what are those white plecos in your display pic? how big do they get?

they are awsome lookin little buggers!

 

[Darkstar]

I think you are talking about the L46 zebra plecs. Yes awesome little buggers indeed and about 3" in size.

http/www.planetcatfish.com/catelog/speci...?species_id=168

 

[smithrc]

smithrc,

what are those white plecos in your display pic? how big do they get?

they are awsome lookin little buggers!

Which ones?

List goes as folllows
Ranger - Zebra (L046) - Flame Cactus (L024) - Para (L075) - White Spot (LDA33) and a Common

I have some Rangers and Flames for sale if your looking - both would get to about 10" max

 

[SuperColey1]