Tiger pleco (L002)

Care at a glance

Overview

A small wood-eating pleco for a tank around 150 liters with driftwood always available. Its gut is built for wood and fiber, so keep soft wood on hand and feed sinking wood-based and vegetable pellets and blanched zucchini, with only occasional protein. Fairly peaceful but territorial around its favored log or cave.

In the wild

Lives in clear, fast, rocky waters of the Tocantins with plenty of sunken wood. Like the rest of the Panaqolus group it is a wood eater, rasping driftwood and digesting the biofilm and fiber, so submerged wood is part of its diet rather than just decor. Wants driftwood, caves, and moving oxygenated water.

Good to know

Traded as L002, this striped wood-eating pleco is sometimes conflated with the described species Panaqolus tankei (L398), though L002 itself remains undescribed. It carries bold dark tiger bands over a lighter body, and the stripe pattern shifts with age. Panaqolus are the small wood-eating cousins of the big royal plecos.

Common questions

Related species

• 

  Flash pleco (L204)

  Panaqolus albivermis

  5.1 in (13 cm) · 40 gal (150 L)

  5.1 in (13 cm)40 gal (150 L)77–84°F (25–29°C)

• 

  Nocturnal panaqolus

  Panaqolus nocturnus

  4.7 in (12 cm) · 30 gal (112 L)

  4.7 in (12 cm)30 gal (112 L)75–84°F (24–29°C)

• 

  Clown pleco

  Panaqolus maccus

  3.5 in (9 cm) · 20 gal (75 L)

  3.5 in (9 cm)20 gal (75 L)73–82°F (23–28°C)

• 

  Galaxy panaqolus

  Panaqolus albomaculatus

  5.5 in (14 cm) · 53 gal (200 L)

  5.5 in (14 cm)53 gal (200 L)77–84°F (25–29°C)

• 

  Iquitos tiger pleco

  Panaqolus changae

  3.9 in (10 cm) · 42 gal (160 L)

  3.9 in (10 cm)42 gal (160 L)77–84°F (25–29°C)

• 

  Bloodred tiger pleco

  Panaqolus claustellifer

  3.1 in (8 cm) · 42 gal (160 L)

  3.1 in (8 cm)42 gal (160 L)77–84°F (25–29°C)