Nothobranchius orthonotus

[erikthur]

I have one 5-6 cm "lonely hearts" 8 weeks old male.
Today I fed him a 3 cm slow-groing Notho male of another species.
Seeing him catch it very fast and just as fast repositioning the prey from tail to head-in I am convinced this species preys on fish similar to the South American Megalebias species.
Comments appreciated...

[hwchoy]

wow! try it again and capture it on video

[nonamethefish]

Since/if they do eat other Nothos in the wild I wonder if that would be healthier for them or not? I can't imagine someone raising, say, N. whitei or something as feeder fish though!
~Joseph

[stormhawk]

Joseph, some people did raise whitei as feeders for other species and I believe a few of them raise the smaller Austrolebias as feeders for their Megalebias.

[erikthur]

Which are the prey of N orthonotus in nature?
Citing Dr Jean Huber (killi-data online):
Sympatric taxa: N. rachovii, regularly / rarely N. furzeri / Lacus. johnstoni.
Thus, most likely N. rachovii.

[stormhawk]

You're correct Erik. N. rachovii is the orthonotus's main prey, as with the case of Paranothobranchius ocellatus with other nothos that are sympatric with it.

[nonamethefish]

Wow-thats pretty interesting they use whitei as feeders. That must mean whitei/austrolebias must be relatively easy?

Perhaps you could switch something with shorter incubation times with N. rachovii such as N. foerschi or korthausae. Dunno if the orthonotus would notice or not.