Tunga garra

Garra bicornuta

Also known as Two-horned garra, Rhino garra

FreshwaterFish

Care at a glance

Temperature: 68–79°F (20–26°C)
pH: 6.5–7.5
Adult size: 4.7 in (12 cm)
Minimum tank: 29 gal (110 L)
Temperament: Mostly peaceful
Social behavior: Social
Swim level: Bottom
Difficulty: Medium
Breeding: No record
Rarity: Rare
Origin: Tunga River, Western Ghats, India
Family: Cyprinidae

Overview

The Tunga garra is a stone-grazing river fish that does best in a small group with current-loving tankmates such as hill-stream barbs and loaches. It works the bottom, gripping rock with a sucker-like mouth to rasp algae and biofilm, and it is mostly peaceful, though males spar face-to-face with their snout knobs lowered, a shoving match that does little harm. Give it strong flow and plenty of grazable stone, and feed both graze and prepared foods: algae wafers, sinking pellets, and frozen bloodworm or brine shrimp. A tank of around 110 liters with brisk current suits a small group.

In the wild

Garra bicornuta lives in the Tunga (Thunga) river system of Karnataka and nearby waters in the northern Western Ghats of India, gripping rock in clear, fast mountain streams. Recreate that with a river tank of smooth boulders and cobbles, strong current, and a well-lit surface to grow the biofilm it grazes. Keep it at 20 to 26 degrees Celsius with pH 6.5 to 7.5, with high oxygen and clean water.

Good to know

Garra bicornuta is a carp-family fish, Cyprinidae, reaching around 12 centimetres, with the sucker lip and flattened belly the genus uses to hold station in current. Its name means two-horned, for a pair of raised knobs mature males develop on the snout. It is native to a small area of the Western Ghats and is listed as Near Threatened; aquarium breeding is not recorded.

Did you know

Many male garras grow raised, tubercled bumps on the snout in the breeding season, and this species is named for having two of them: bicornuta means two-horned, taxonomy simply counting the headgear.