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Tuesday, August 6, 2013

Tips For Keeping The African Butterfly Fish

If you're looking for an unusual looking fish to add to your acquiring him then you might want to consider the Pantodon buchholzi or African Butterfly Fish.

This unique fish almost looks like a butterfly when viewed from above at his fins stick out like wing's. Native to Africa, this fish lives in the slow moving rivers of the rain forest and has been sold commercially for over 90 years. This fish can grow to be about 4 inches long and can live about five years.

While the butterfly fish is fairly easy to keep, he can be a bit sensitive and you must act relating to the tank properly. Be sure to take a bit longer than you do with other fish perhaps an hour or so to slowly introduced tank water into his floating bag. You should have an aquarium that is larger than 20 gallons and the temperature of between 75 and 82°F along with the PH of six to 7.5. Also, it is imperative that you have a good cover for your tank that has absolutely no holes in it as this fish is well-known for jumping out at even the smallest hole in an aquarium cover.

The African butterfly fish is a surfaced dweller and can be a bit nervous so it is ideal if you can put some live floating plants and the tank along with him for cover. He can be a bit territorial, though, and if you have smaller surface dwelling fish will probably eat them so you want to be careful about the types of fish you put in the query them with your butterfly fish. Having said that, he can live peacefully with many other types of fish and basically ignores anything that hangs around in the middle or bottom of the tank. It is also safe to put service drawing fish that are larger than your butterfly fish into the tank with him.

The butterfly fish is basically a carnivore and while you can feed him some pellet and flake foods he will do best in his diet has a lot of live, frozen or freeze dried protein foods. He might like some to affect forms, blood worms or brine shrimp. You can also feed him live insects such as cricketer daddy longlegs and even some small live fish every once in awhile. Whatever you feed him, be sure that it floats since he feeds on the surface only and if the food since he probably won't get a meal.

The African butterfly fish can be a good community finish as long as you adhere to the warnings above. Once he's acclimated into the tank he's fairly easy to maintain as long as you feed improperly and keep the area maintained properly.

Find out more about tropical fish by visiting http://www.fish-tank-guide.com - a website that offers articles on aquarium setup and maintenance as well as information on tropical fish such as the the African Butterfly Fish.

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