Breeding behavior?
Gulper catfish trio, ~7"
- Thread starter thebiggerthebetter
- Start date
JJ covered it pretty agreeably above. If all the t's are crossed and i's dotted, it's only a matter of time until it relaxes enough, gets hungry enough and caves to your feed offerings. For healthy and sizeable fish, I usually advise everyone to offer only what they want to feed their fish from the moment the fish arrives and on. 1-2 weeks of adaption time to new tank is common. For more wayward, stronger-willed fish, even a month of learning to recognize new feed types is also common.
Seems to be one plausible guess. But the peer's gulpers I mentioned with no fins are unlikely to be sexually mature. They got them little like 3" and under a year ago.
My gulper has been having some strange behavior as well, I finally managed to catch it on camera. Does anyone know what he’s doing? I assume that he's just playing but I'd like to here your thoughts.
Playing? I'd bet folding money that he is not playing.
I love catfish, one of my favourite groups of fish, but they are as dumb as rocks with very little in the way of individuality or unique personalities. I don't really believe that any fish have the intellectual horsepower required to engage in something as complex and advanced as "play"...and certainly not catfish.
I love catfish, one of my favourite groups of fish, but they are as dumb as rocks with very little in the way of individuality or unique personalities. I don't really believe that any fish have the intellectual horsepower required to engage in something as complex and advanced as "play"...and certainly not catfish.
Yeah the white is a piece of tilapia I had just put in. But he does things like this even when there's not food in the tank.
This would be stranger by a lot but nothing occurs to me other than a predatory lunge at something on the clean and clear bottom, perhaps some weird reflection or something like that sets off the gulper. There are some weird reflected lines visible in the video on the bottom.
Non-eating update on the septet:
Does anyone’s gulper have trouble seeing. Mine responds to light but he frequently bumps into the sides of his tank and has serious trouble finding food. Whenever he gets spooked it takes him several minutes to find his way back to his hide. This is the only gulper I’ve kept and I don’t know if gulpers generally have bad vision or if mine is just impaired.
If this is a long term behavior, I'd say from our experience that this is not normal. Perhaps there may be simple causes, e.g. too bright lighting. Also, our gulpers have periods of feeding a lot less than during other times, during which one may think their gulper has trouble finding feed until after lights out. It is usually is quite easy to hand feed your gulper and then one knows instantly whether they are hungry or not.
We haven't noticed our gulpers to get spooked. They appear to be pretty indifferent, oblivious to what's happening around them.
If yours spooks, one thought might be that the fish is stressed, uncomfortable and the reason should be sought and corrected. Gulpers are a specialty fish, harder than usual to keep successfully because they come from particular waters and need appropriate pH and hardness.
As noted in the last video, our gulpers all have a bit cloudy eyes and a small white speck in the middle, which may be the norm or maybe their reaction to our water, I don't know yet.
We haven't noticed our gulpers to get spooked. They appear to be pretty indifferent, oblivious to what's happening around them.
If yours spooks, one thought might be that the fish is stressed, uncomfortable and the reason should be sought and corrected. Gulpers are a specialty fish, harder than usual to keep successfully because they come from particular waters and need appropriate pH and hardness.
As noted in the last video, our gulpers all have a bit cloudy eyes and a small white speck in the middle, which may be the norm or maybe their reaction to our water, I don't know yet.