Slender catfish

Care at a glance

Overview

The slender catfish is an active, mostly peaceful shoaling fish that does best in a group and is happier and bolder in numbers. It is a nocturnal hunter that will eat very small fish and shrimp, so keep it with tankmates too large to swallow. Feed sinking pellets, frozen foods, and other meaty items after lights out. A group needs open space in a tank of at least 150 liters. Handle it carefully, since the fin spines readily snag skin and netting.

In the wild

The slender catfish is a widespread South American species of rivers and streams, shoaling in midwater and over the bottom and hunting after dark. It has a silvery, streamlined body, a dark lateral stripe, and very long trailing barbels used to find food in low light. Give it open swimming space, driftwood, and dim lighting, with soft to neutral water at 22 to 26 degrees C.

Good to know

Pimelodella gracilis reaches about 17 cm and belongs to a group of long-whiskered catfish once placed with the pimelodids and now often classified in the family Heptapteridae. The genus is notoriously hard to tell apart, so many silvery striped fish in the trade are labeled gracilis without certainty. It carries sharp pectoral spines that can jab and tangle in a net.

Did you know

Its barbels can be as long as its whole body, sweeping ahead of the fish like feelers to locate food in the dark.

Related species

• Asian bumblebee catfish

  Pseudomystus siamensis

  5.9 in (15 cm)30 gal (115 L)68–79°F (20–26°C)

• 

  Red wolf fish

  Erythrinus erythrinus

  7.9 in (20 cm)40 gal (150 L)72–79°F (22–26°C)

• 

  Black calvus

  Altolamprologus calvus

  5.1 in (13 cm)53 gal (200 L)75–81°F (24–27°C)

• 

  Burmese border loach

  Botia histrionica

  5.1 in (13 cm)53 gal (200 L)72–82°F (22–28°C)

• 

  Bloch's catfish

  Pimelodus blochii

  9.8 in (25 cm)53 gal (200 L)68–79°F (20–26°C)

• 

  Paradise Threadfin

  Polynemus paradiseus

  9.8 in (25 cm)75 gal (285 L)75–82°F (24–28°C)