[Citizen Snips]

Hey guys,

Just got back from PA and brought with me a 4 inch green sunfish from our lake out back. I currently have a 40 gallon tall tank with a 3 inch gold gourami, a 3 inch Ornate Bichir and two 1.5 inch female bettas.

I currently have him sitting in a 10 gallon quarantine tank. I really want to try bringing him into my show tank. It's fully planted with fluorite and looks like a great new habitat for him, but I'm worried about his additude toward my other fish. I've read that these fish can be aggressive and I tried to catch the smallest one I could. I am already thinking of removing the female bettas to the quarantine and swap the two since if anything would happen I feel they would be the first target, but again they do get over 3 inches and are pretty tough.

Any tips? Do you guys have any native / tropical mix tank experience? I've head it's possible it just depends on how early you acclimate since natives are used to fighting for their food.

I would like this to work out but if not I can always set him free again in the same lake. But it would be a shame.

 

[emc7]

From what I've read sunfish are a lot like jewel cichlid sand can get aggressive when breeding. Generally not a good idea to mix native and tropicals. First they like different temps and second you expose them to each others potential illness.

Once you take a fish from the wild, keep it or euthanize it or sell it on aquabid.com, but don't put it back. Its illegal in many places and you don't want to release one of the current nasty aquarium strains of fish disease into the wild where the fish have no resistance to it.

 

[TheOldSalt]

Green sunnies are some of the meanest, nastiest little boogers you've ever seen. Their mouths are freakishly huge, and if you put that fish in your tank, it will quickly devour every other fish in it.

 

[Citizen Snips]

lol good to know thanks guys.

 

[Corwin]

yeah, I myself actualy keep them and they will attack anything else you put into the tank with them (unless it is considerably larger than them). The only other thing which I was able to keep them with was a pleco. They are a very interesting and long lived fish, so I would deffinitely recomend them to other people, but you prety much have to keep them in a species tank.

Oh and also they can grow to be decently large later in life, so while they may be small now, they wont be in a few years.

 

[petlovingfreak]

I recently acquired 2 of these and have them in one of my tanks, and I agree, they are nasty, they killed all of our bushynose plecos (around 12 of them) and my younger rapheal catfish. Other than that I haven't seen them pick on anyone else (they are in with a red devil, jack dempsey, a couple bala sharks and a sydontis catfish.

 

[Ghost Knife]

I recently acquired 2 of these and have them in one of my tanks, and I agree, they are nasty, they killed all of our bushynose plecos (around 12 of them) and my younger rapheal catfish. Other than that I haven't seen them pick on anyone else (they are in with a red devil, jack dempsey, a couple bala sharks and a sydontis catfish.

Geez, they indeed must be some bad buggers. I have a 6" long 3" wide Striped Raphael and it seems that none of the other fish I have even think about bothering him. I'll just remember to stay away from Sunfish.

 

[Corwin]

yup their basicaly something you have to keep in a species tank, they arent even terribly nice to eachother (though they wont fin nip or kill eachother)

 

[Mikaila31]

I would eat it if it was bigger.....

 

[Corwin]

actualy a lot of people do eat sunfish, I do believe they fall into the panfish category... though if yourse is an infant it may be a tad small.

 

[emc7]

Africans sun-dry small cichlids and eat them like chips, I bet that would work for sunfish.

 

[Corwin]

hmm that sounds intruiging. I wonder if I could find the recipy somewhere.... I wouldnt actualy mind trying that

 

[cichbilly]

ive got 2 greenies ive had in my tank together (with a chinese sucker) for 2-3 months ... both started about an inch maybe 1.5 long ... now the bigger one is almost 4 and the littler one is 3-3.5 ... they are brutal ruthless! 20 1" guppies in one day! lots of crickets whenever i can catch em and rose reds are their favorite! ... i read up on them and they can go up to 12" ... ive only caught them out of the lake about 6-8 ... maybe at 12-15" ill have a good dinner!

 

[Corwin]

correction to my earlier posts mine are actualy pumpkinseeds but either way, as far asI know most NA sunfish act very similar