Loaches Online Forum

hi all
just seen a video of gastromyzon ocellatus in the wild by Michael Lo. thanks to P. Sewer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gfI3Dud_3U
cheers charles

Thanks for posting!
Its always great to see these fish in their natural habitat.

Thanks for sharing Charles, they're my favorite! I only wish it was longer.

Thank you for valuable information!!

I understood the tendency that they preferred low water temperature to other Gastromyzon.
Their habitat could confirm that it was meters above the sea level around 1,000m, and I understood.

Their tail and fins usually turned red, but there was the individual which became blue.

Unfortunately there is not ocellatus now.
I wait for the arrival, but G.ocellatus does not readily arrive at Japan.

hi odyssey
it's a pity but if I understand right you have two of them, shown in the two pictures?
and two different species, farragus and ocellatus. but I guess you already knew.
about water-temp preference: that's a pure theory at the moment. as long we don't even know water temp along the dry and rainy season, and even less temperatures at different altitudes ... and we don't know, where the specimen were caught ... temp indications are made by scientists in the field or hobbyists, all in low water times. I hoped "borneosucker" could do some evaluations, but he is very hard working at the moment.
I keep all with falling and raising temp (now at 20° in the morning). in other words: a system of two heatings in cold rooms, one with the minimum temp. permanently. one connected with the timer with a 23° adjustment. in summer it's sometimes warmer.
about the colours: I have some without, some with red, some with blue. may be that's in the habitat itself or different local populations get mixed up. I'll see if H.H.Tan knows more.
cheers charles

Hi ch.koenig!
Those pictures of G.ocellatus are past shot.
I wait for those arrival information for more than one year, but do not know information arrived at.

I was able to know the approximate habitat of G.ocellatus by a book of H.H.Tan.
I understood the situation of the habitat that was more concrete than by information of Youtube which you introduced this time.

Padawan, Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia.
There is highland resort of Borneo.
Though there is the tropical zone, the temperature seems to be 28 degrees from 18 degrees Celsius.
It is cooler than Japanese summer.
http://www.cuti.com.my/hotel/info.php3? ... nds+Resort.

I traveled to Gunung Mulu of Borneo in March of this year.
Unfortunately a river rose at that time, I was not able to see Gastromyzon .
I intended to make a voyage to Borneo again, and the Padawan joined the candidate of the destination.

I tried based on the explanation of the characteristic of the pattern of the book of H.H.Tan before to distinguish them from G.ocellatus in G.farragus.
But I have given up the identification of the species only with the characteristic of the pattern now. There are many cases that a pattern changes when I breed it for a long term.
I think that the times when even a commoner can distinguish it by DNA information will come soon.

It is G.ocellatus or G.farragus as follows.






ocellatus,zebrinus,ctenocephalus sequentially from the top.

hi odyssey
the range of 18-28° is what different sources say. a good tolerance for an aquarium-fish! (for sewellia and pseudogastromyzon it's even larger)
it's a pity about your trip. as M. Lo said: nowadays there is sometimes more rain in dry season than in rainy-season.
it's not always easy to make out farragus. lateral "eyes", "wormlike" structures on head means no farragus. the rest is variations of the theme.
some ocellatus come near to this profile; without very good pictures for scale-counting it's mission impossible
some pictures (out of hundreds)?

classic ocellatus as shown in Tan's book, close to the paratype, hard to find


current typical pattern above


beautiful farragus-male


head of farragus

but even with habitat-pictures it isn't easy ...
http://www.ibanorum.netfirms.com/gastromyzonA.htm
http://www.ibanorum.netfirms.com/gastromyzonC.htm
water temperature in april
http://www.ibanorum.netfirms.com/gastromyzonD.htm

cheers charles

Hi ch.koenig!
Thank you for pictures and a link.

I referred to this website on the occasion of the Borneo trip of this year.
I look forward to the update of this site, but there is not a new post since May.
http://www.ibanorum.netfirms.com/banjar ... return.htm

Entrance.

Exit.

I have a few of what I have always thought were ocelatus, but as the fish aged and grew, the markings have become more like farragus.
I had heard that farragus is not in the fish trade yet. Is that true?
Here are a few pics of some of my "ocellatus".
Some I have had for 7 years.

This one I have probably had about 4-5 years.

This one I have had 7 years, also.

This one is about 4 years old.

hi odyssey
good pictures. as you can see in borneosuckers (drawings of head-underside) it's hard to judge by a picture, differences are to small and not contrasting very much. I'll try a trick if you send me a picture with the original size. for more pictures by M.Lo you have to wait for to the beginning of next year. he is more in plants nowadays.
yes jim that's another problem. I sometimes find it hard to identify grown specimen by the old pictures but didn't realise that it becomes even more accentuated.
but it's good to hear something about the age of specimen. I'm collecting infos about that too, because nobody has a precise idea about lifespan. one thing I remember is my first experience in the early 80es when I lost ctenocephalus after 5 years. of course we didn't know anything about and the keeping was not very apt to the needs of these marvelous rarities.
and there is another open question: do they grow? after the breeding of some lineolata and spottee I have a hypothesis: it all depends on the food supply of the first weeks. my first f1-lineolatas (as those of farid) won't reach more than about 4 cm but are breeding. tomorrow I'll see a big quantity of f1 on a visit, growing fast and reproducing in big quantities ("hundreds") I've got very big stellatus, smaller ones that won't visibly grow after more than a year ...
spotted are here on sale for the moment in an incredible size, all 7-8.5 cm and in a stunning yellow-golden colouring. seems they had exellent conditions.
farragus are in the trade occasionally as they are found in a river-system nearby to ocellatus. there too I hope to have more infos next year from catchers. even main samplers in borneo just don't know much where they come from exactly. catchers won't tell.
and another question: it seems to me that ocellatus tend to develop "big mamas" as dominant specimen in a tank?
cheers charles

All the ocellatus I have had did grow, some substantially.
The large one in the top pic is the dominant "big momma" in the tank. The larg brown one in the third pic is a close second.
I have also noticed a color difference with some having a purple tint to the base color (pic 1&2) and some having a brown base color (pic 3 & 4)

thanks jim
yes colours can be very different

cheers charles

That's impressive Jim, 7 years! You're doing something right. i've had trouble keeping them for very long. I just lost my oldest one, about a year with me. It also did the pattern change from typical occelatus to the more spotted/farragus looking pattern. Up till now I've been keeping them in the river tank with sewellia but have decided to end that. The 1 occelatus that I have now is in with the gobies and thriving. It's doubled in size already. it's the first one that I've witnessed eating offered foods and readily takes anything I feed. Taking bloodworms/brineshrimp etc. out of the water column and battling with the gobies, even the sicyopterus many times larger for bottom pellets. Here are a few pics.

Nice looking fish!!!
I wonder about keeping these guys with Sewellia too, since the Sewellia can push them away from the food. I do have some (the smaller two in my pics) in with Sewellia, but they have learned to get onto the java fern leaves at feeding time and wait form me to place the bloodworms and brine shrimp there, away from the Sewellia.

hi plaalyle
I think that's a good idea. what species is the one with ocellatus in the second picture?
yes jim I think ocellatus to be the "cleverests" and I think ther's a context with their remarkable social behaviour
cheers charles