New Auchenoglanis species??

[MarkSmith]

Photos this species in various stages of grow are listed as Auchenoglanis cf. occidentalis in the catfish catalog.

Hi Jools, feel free to add these two images to the catalog at your convenience.

[MarkSmith]

Thanks for your observations, Sidguppy.

From a behavioral note: The larger it grows, the more it seems to come out into the open, although currently it is still somewhat skittish when I approach the aquarium. I am looking forward to being able to train it to eat from my hand someday.

[Birger]

The two most recent images are now in the Cat-eLog in

Auchenoglanis cf_occidentalis

Fish does look good.

The growth really has slowed down big time, went from an average of 3.5 cm per month in the first 5 months....then in the next 7.5 months only grew a total of 3 cm in length.
Birger

[MarkSmith]

We had a parcicularly cold winter for southern California, that came very early for us, approx. the end of October. This caused the water temp in its aquarium to go down to the mid 70s (aquarium is in the garage) and along with that, less food intake.

I am looking forward to seeing it eat more once our weather warms up and the aquarium temp rises again into the low 80s.

[Birger]

We had a parcicularly cold winter for southern California,

We have had an unusually mild winter for our area...which of course I appreciated.

Birger

[MarkSmith]

Yes, the weather in north America has been quite screwy this past winter. Two weeks ago, the temp reached 88 F for two days, then plummeted to the upper 50s in the day time. Night time for us has been about the mid 30s, which for us, is rather cold. I know many people reading this who come from colder climes may be laughing at our "cold" weather though.

[unblinded]

I was just reading through some older threads and came across this beautiful Auchenoglanis. I'm curious as to it's size now, over a year later. Any updates?

[JonesE]

Just saw one today at the lfs and was wondering how large has yours gotten? any comments on size and attitude?

[Viktor Jarikov]

Me too. Any updates, @MarkSmith?

Mark, one reason is described here: http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/view ... 51#p289951 I am buying these two "bouche" based on Kirk's (yellowcat) experience with two of his but Kirk appears to have observed a substantially faster growth rate or so I surmise:

... Well I can say that the photo's show that these fish are definitely the 'bouche' variety of a. occidentals, I obtained mine from Rehoboth Aquatics, the first to import them I believe and I raised and sold a pair years ago when they grew past 15", the second owner sold them again when they reached around 24" and were reported to continue to grow larger after...

[MarkSmith]

Hi Victor. It has been awhile since posting about Auchenoglanis sp. "Bouche". My specimen is only about 16 to 17 inches total length. I have cut back on feeding it only 2 times per week, so it will not grow so quickly. Right now, I just do not have the space to encourage it to grow larger. It is interesting to know that some in the hobby are now over 24 inches. Seems like it has the capability to grow as large as the standard Auchenoglanis size?