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This fish is a pretty cool addition to any semi-aggressive tank. I have seen them more and more frequently in the past few months at LFS, and they are even for sale at Petsmarts, though they call them by the ridiculous name of African Bush Fish. A plus about this fish is that they are pretty friendly with anything that can't fit inside its own mouth, and normally doesn't get bothered by anything that can't eat it. However it's probably a good idea to keep one per tank, as they get snippy towards their own kind as they age. I have had my guy for about four months now, and he has already doubled in size. I feed him some pellets, flakes, but mostly chopped up earth worms. As a side note: Earthworms are the best and most underated live food. I have a bichir, 2 angels, 2 yoyos, pictus, betta, 4 Apisto cacatoides, and a tiger salamander. I can feed them all for a week with bucks worth of worms. Anywho, my ctenopoma also has great personality. He rarely spends his time hiding, though he occassionaly visits the pictus in his fortress of solitude made of slate rocks, he's normally floating around the middle of the tank observing the goings-on in my aquatic microcosm. Frequently he is ramming his head up against the glass to get a better look at me just as I'm trying to get a better look at him.
I have a male leopard with an oscar and 2 convict cichlids. They get along great! My oscar and leopard gourami are best budies, swimming around the tank together. I got my oscar when he was smaller than the leopard, but he soon grew much bigger. My leopard's favourite spot in the tank is beside the filter. I wouldn't recommend putting the leopard gourami with large cichlids as they will likely bully it.
This fish is truly striking and is my favorite fish in my tank. I bought it under the name leopard gourami when it was about 3 cm long. It is now more than 10 cm. It has eaten some of my cardinal tetras and otocinclus, but learned to live with them. The vacuum-like mouth is a great force, sucking any small fish/food into it. Truly an amazing fish.
I feel morally compelled to provide an update on my experience. Shortly after I wrote the previous comments, my Ctenopoma acutirostre underwent a sudden growth spurt (it gained over four centimeters in fewer than two months!); it then immediately began harassing its tank mates. Hoping that more territorial space would solve the problem, I moved all fish into a larger tank. The algae eater was then left in peace, but my bush fish continued to harass the glow-light tetras with increasing brutality - even though they were still too big to fit in its mouth! Due to physical signs of stress, I had to put two of the tetras out of their misery; the remaining ones were returned to the store for credit. Missing the bright orange color of the tetras, I purchased a clown loach for the tank - and I'm happy to report that peace has been fully restored. I would also add that this species doesn't require live food to thrive; I've trained mine to eagerly accept small cichlid pellets. However, I would definitely recommend live food at least once every two weeks - mine really gets excited when an earthworm, or spoonful of brine shrimp, gets dropped into its tank.
I have kept a pair of these fish for about five years now. They are truly beautiful fish and incredible to watch. They will darken as they age, blending more with the environment and I find mine to be rather shy. They were sold as African leaf fish. My duo accept frozen brine shrimp, blood worms, and beef heart, as well as flake foods and krill. I feed them before I turn on the lights, and it is fascinating to watch the shadows gliding in the water. Fellow inhabitants include a brown knife fish and a synodontis catfish. All in all, one of my favorite tanks.
I am currently keeping a 3 cm Ctenopoma with a Polypterus senegalus, Platydoras costatus, and an albino Chitala ornata. So far the compatability has been excellent. I've got them in a 200 L, they all seem to scope out their own hide spots except for the raphael cat. He noses into everybody's business but they don't mind. The Ctenopoma hides in the roots of a dracena plant that I accidently broke off and placed in my aquarium to take root, he hides in there and assumes the vertical position, he is accepting the tiniest guppies, and is taking baby snails off of the leaves that hang into the aquarium.
I know that I've done more than my fair share of gushing over this species (this is my third comment!), and perhaps what I have to say here is more appropriate for the Tales section, but it is testament to the true hardiness of this species. A couple of months ago, my house caught on fire (thankfully, no humans were home, or injured); my aquarium was near the entrance to the room where the fire started. The force of the fire was so explosive, that the hood of the tank was blown clear across the room. All plastic components of my set-up were at least partially melted. The live plants in the tank (mostly Java ferns and Heteranthera) were cooked to nearly liquid form. The water in the tank was black with soot. Needless to say, I did not expect any fish to have survived ... and none did, except one: you guessed it, the Ctenopoma was very much alive! Though clearly traumatized, he was still physically robust, and put up quite a fight when I tried to scoop him out (yes, I was able to establish long ago that he's male - the males develop small spines on edge of their gill plates as they mature). Obviously, being an anabantoid enabled him to survive the soot-choked water. How he managed to survive the intense heat, however, is beyond me! A friend of my wife offered to care for him while our house is being repaired, and now I'm beginning to worry that she won't want to give him back!
I have two spotted climbing perch, or African spotted leaffish as they are termed at the pet store I work in. My 12 cm leaffish live very peacefully in a planted 170 L bowfront with a large rainbow shark, a gourami, mid-sized rainbowfish, a small stone fish, and a 28 cm dinosaur bichir. They are not aggressive, and not at all shy. They tend to people watch and will come right up to the glass to say hello. The leaf fish will drift around lazily all day and seem to sleep in the night. They are very hardy and easy to care for, adjusting to different tank conditions without stressing. I recommend them to anyone interested in large community or semi-aggressive fish. Anyway, I just felt that some of the comments left on your spotted climbing perch page about them needing a ton of space and being aggressive, and territorial were inaccurate, but I do appreciate all the information collected by people who obviously have a passion for their fish.
I don't really think it's fair of Vanessa to accuse others of reporting inaccurate information, simply because they report experiences that differ from her own. I hate to anthropomorphize, but one of the things that makes this species so fascinating to own is that individual specimens exhibit distinct personalities (for lack of a better word). I am happy for her that her Ctenopomas get along well with all of their tank mates, something which I myself reported after finding more appropriate tank mates for mine; she's probably also had a little more success from the beginning because she started out with a larger tank than I did. We're all here to learn from each other, not to question the validity of each others' experiences.
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