Line-spot spiny eel

Care at a glance

Overview

Keep the line-spot spiny eel on its own, since it lives solitary and is intolerant of its own kind in a shared tank. It is a small, community-scale eel that buries in sand by day and forages the bottom at night, so a soft sand bed and quiet hides come first. It leaves alone anything too big to eat but will take very small fish, so give it steady, mid-sized companions instead of tiny ones. Feed meaty foods such as frozen bloodworm, live blackworm, daphnia, and small pieces of earthworm near the substrate after dark. About 200 liters with a soft sand bottom and a tight cover is enough for this community-scale eel.

In the wild

The line-spot spiny eel comes from slow, weedy waters of northern India in the Ganges drainage, among plants and soft sediment. Recreate that with a sand base, generous planting, some wood, and gentle flow. Temperatures around 23 to 28 C and a soft, near-neutral pH of 6.0 to 7.5 suit it, with stable, clean conditions and enough cover and fine substrate for it to bury and browse.

Good to know

Macrognathus lineatomaculatus is a small spiny eel of the family Mastacembelidae, reaching about 22 centimeters. Ralf Britz described it in 2010 as part of a review of the spiny eels of northeastern India. The name combines lined and spotted, describing the dark blotches strung along its flanks and fins. No aquarium spawning has been recorded.

Did you know

The tongue-twisting name lineatomaculatus is really just the fish's pattern written out in Latin: lineatus for lined and maculatus for spotted, so the label describes the markings a keeper sees at a glance.

Common questions

Related species

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