CichlidFish.com - Fish That Think.

Someone in my city listed one of these fish for sale. 10 inches.

I was wanting to get him and put him in with my O's. Do you guys think they would be okay together? I know it's hard to say. Have any of you ever kept them together?

amy5335 wrote:Someone in my city listed one of these fish for sale. 10 inches.

I was wanting to get him and put him in with my O's. Do you guys think they would be okay together? I know it's hard to say. Have any of you ever kept them together?

Here's a good site to start studying: http://www.polypterus.info

Seems to me that they may get a little too large for your tank, but I don't know --

Reading around a little more at the abovementioned website, the author of a "Practical Fishkeeping" article seems to indicate that they would be fine in a 48" tank and their only aggressiveness would be conspecific, so your larger tank may be fine. But it looks like there's several species that vary in size, so you may need to pin down which species of ropefish is for sale.

There are several species of these, and as Mark noted, they differ in size.  I've kept a few, and I think they're pretty neat.  Two things you need to be careful of:

1.  Size mismatch.  If your O is large enough that this (or any) fish will fit in his mouth, it probably will end up there.  The reverse is also true.  The bichirs will also eat fish small enough to fit in their mouths.

2.  Polypterus and other bichirs are serious escape artists.  You have to SERIOUSLY secure your tank lid, minimizing space around heaters, air tubes, power filters, etc.  Otherwise they'll go exploring, and you'll find them dried up on the floor somewhere.

I know how that is. lol I have 2 ropefish. Neither have escaped, luckily.

I did some searching, but I didn't see anything that said a 150 gallons is too small?? I am upgrading to like 250 gallons soon.

Your 150 should be fine.  Be sure and provide a few hiding places.