Vampiric Acanthocobitis rubidipinnis

[The.Dark.One]

Noticed something weird today. A friend of mine asked me to take a look at a large (16-18 inch) Pimelodella gracilis he has, because he said a large and deep wound had opened up on it recently.

When he got the fish to come out of its pipe, there was a huge hole in its underside and side, with skin, muscle all eaten back, with part of the swimbladder and outer lining of the stomach showing. He thinks it may have started as a heater burn but upon him seeing it with me, couldnt believe how much bigger it had got in such a short space of time. Whilst we were pondering what to do with the fish, up swam a 5 inch A. rubidipinnis and latched onto the edge of the wound and started sucking (not visibly biting) at the edge of it, and redness could be seen around that region. It did this twice in the short space of time we were looking. The poor catfish was in a state of shock and was seemingly oblivious to this going off. We now know why the wound has got so much bigger in such a short space of time. The catfish has now been put in a hospital tank but not sure if he will make it.
Has anyone seen Acanthocobitis exhibiting this type of behaviour?

[Emma Turner]

I've seen something very similar, once with Schistura nicholsi and once with Yasuhikotakia eos, but not with any Acanthocobitis. In each case, one fish in the tank developed a small wound for whatever reason, then the others were found to be relentlessly picking at it, seeming to want to keep latching on. In effect this was stopping the wound healing, and making it bigger. Luckily when these incidents occured, they were caught well in time. At first, when we hadn't realised what was happening, they were medicated, and when the treatment didn't seem to be doing anything, we watched more carefully for signs of aggression and to our surprise saw this constant picking at the wound by others of the same species in the tank. We immediately moved the affected fish to another tank so they could heal and to date have never lost anything in this way. However, the wound on that Pim sounds pretty bad.

Good luck,

Emma

[Martin Thoene]

I would put this down to the rawness of nature. It's definitely a "survival of the fittest" type of thing. I've seen cute little 1" Clown Loaches tear apart a sickly individual in a dealer's tank before now. Like a bunch of Piranha.

Martin.

[The.Dark.One]

Thanks guys

I hope the fish lives, its a stunning specimen.