Columbian Shark

C

cabo

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I was reading that even though a Columbian Shark (catfish) is sold as a freshwater fish, as it matures it goes to brackish then to saltwater. In fact a lot of people say the have to have the salt to survive well. I have one in my freshwater tank and was thinking of adding him to the salt ( I was going to set up a tank and convert the water slowly to full salinity, not just drop him in). Does anyone have any experience with this? I know he will eat some shrimp (my lionfish has not been able to eat my only peppermint shrimp yet cuz he hides so well) and other motile inverts, but will it mess with coral?

Also how long to convert him? I read one person did it in 2 hours and the fish survived, but sounds unreasonable to me.

Also what freshwater diseases or parasites would survive a conversion?

Sorry for all the questions..prolly should be mor than one thread.

Thanks for any input.
 
I am going to make a go of it and try and document it...
Found several places that said 2-5 hours on acclimation.
I am going to put him on a slow drip overnight and see how he does.
I will post more when I got more..with some pics.

As far as the parasites and such, after doing much reading I can find no common critters that are Euryhaline (can tolerate salt and fresh water).
So, I am not going to worry about QT..plus I have had the fish in my freshwater tank for 6 month now and he is health.

Hope he makes it ok, from what I can tell from my research he will do better in the salt water anyway, and grow to 1-1/2 feet!
 
Last night I spent 6 hours (till 1 am) acclimating the Colombian Shark to salt water. I started with a slow drip until it had a SG of 1.01. I then started to remove water and continue the same drip rate. After 3 hours I was only at 1.015. I continued to remove water and increased the drip. By 1 am I had a good match from my tank to the bucket. Fish never showed any sign of distress during the process.
 
Once in the tank he was fine until he discovered the Tube anenome..
In the morning he was doing fine but would not eat yet..He always ate well in the freshwater tank..sure he is a little confused with his new surroundings.

More about it came from below:

http://tinyurl.com/444xkh
 
I have one of these, It is a Silver Tipped Shark.

I bought mine when it was 1" long, super tiny!

After it was about 5" (about 1 year) moved it to a 150 gallon tank running freshwater. I added salt and raised to salinity by 2 points each day over the course of about 2 weeks to get the salinity up to about 1.021.

I then let it grow to about 7" (about 6 months) and slowly increased the salinity to 1.024

It has now been in my reef tank @ SG 1.026 for about 9 months now. I would guess he is about 8" and has a voracious appetite, eating silversides, krill and mysis.

He gets along great with all of reef inhabitants, and I have had him for about 2.5 years now!

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If you look closely here you can see him too...
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Please note that if his skin starts falling off (NO JOKE!)

The salinity is too high for him, and needs a much longer acclimation time.

Just keep an eye on it.

Once you see a spot form, you can recover, IF you treat the situation properly.
 
He is reef safe, he is also big and clumsy. I would suggest nothing smaller that 100 gallon tank for them. They will get 8"-10" long...

They are clumsy, and will steal food from anyone if given the chance or not fed first.
He steals big stuff from the LTA, and sometimes the button polyps, but doesn't hurt them.
They will also eat any fish smaller than a damsel.

I feed mine silversides and krill. And occasionally shrimp pellets.
 
In the wild the adults swim up estuaries and rivers from the ocean.
In the weeks or months that I takes them to swim up there they gradually move from saltwater, to brackish, and then for a short period of time freshwater. They lay their eggs up river in the freshwater, and then return to the ocean. The young grow up in freshwater, and are slowly swept toward the ocean where they move again from fresh, to brackish, to saltwater, over the course of a couple to six months.
And then as they reach breeding age, they make the return trip up stream.

It has been observed in captivity to induce spawning you can gradually move an adult Silver Tipped Shark or Columbian Shark to freshwater, simulating them swimming upstream.



heres a decent page with a picture of what happens when you don't put them in saltwater...

http://badmanstropicalfish.com/profiles/profile63.html
 
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