Painted mormyrid

Care at a glance

Overview

A medium-large elephantfish that is nocturnal, shy, and highly sensitive to its water. Keep it singly, as it is intolerant of its own kind, and choose tankmates with caution: calm, similarly sized fish that will not nip or crowd it. Give it a smooth, soft sand bed it can forage over without scraping itself, wood for cover, low light, and very stable water. Feed meaty sinking foods such as bloodworm, blackworm, and earthworm in the evening. At around 30 cm it needs plenty of floor space, on the order of 600 liters.

In the wild

Hippopotamyrus pictus ranges across the Nile and the Nilo-Sudanic rivers of Africa, foraging over sandy bottoms in warm, flowing water. To suit it, provide a soft sand substrate, driftwood and other cover for daytime shelter, and subdued lighting. Keep the water warm at 23-28 C and neutral, around pH 6.5-7.5, and very steady, since mormyrids are among the first fish to suffer when water quality slips or copper medications are used.

Good to know

This elephantfish of the family Mormyridae reaches about 30 cm and reads its surroundings with a weak electric organ discharge from the tail. Its species name, pictus, means painted, after its markings, while the genus name pairs the Greek roots for hippopotamus, literally river horse, with the mormyrid line. It was described in 1864. Its breeding is not recorded in aquaria.

Did you know

The species name pictus simply means painted, for the fish's markings; the genus name Hippopotamyrus folds in the Greek for hippopotamus, which itself literally means river horse.

Common questions

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