Aquarium Project - Common Snakehead
Recently me and a buddy went to an ex-mining area to do some light fishing for snakeheads. We caught and released a few juvenile Chevron Snakeheads (Channa Striata) casting along the banks of the abandoned ponds. The trip was nothing to shout about but after landing the last fish, I decided to keep one as a pet in my mini aquarium at home. The specimen is roughly about 7" long which is considered a juvenile. I wanted to keep the fish as I want to observe & study it's behaviour. Chevron Snakeheads are the most tolerant and easy to keep among the snakehead species. It really doesn't require much knowledge to keep & feed one, provided, you give it sufficient space as well as relatively clean waters.
Some questions that I had always wanted to know.
(1) How long before it rises to surface for air?
(2) How much would it eat in a day?
(3) What sort of food that it favors?
(4) Where does it spend most of it's time, bottom, mid-water or surface?
(5) How fast does it heal after a hook goes through it's mouth?
(6) How soon would it go back to feeding after injury?
So I took the fish home. Bought a 1.5ft wide tank, installed a small water filter & added some vegetation into the tank. Pour in some rainwater that I had collected overnight and finally put the fish in. I also bought about 30 baby carps as food for the snakehead. One thing to remember though, snakeheads, especially the Chevron Snakehead is a jumper, especially the smaller ones. If you don't secure a roof or netting of some kind over the tank, the fish will jump out.
It has been a week since I kept the snakehead. It has not paid much attention to the baby carps that I put in. Preferring to stay at the bottom most of the time, it probably still is traumatised after I caught it. The wound caused by hook on it's left mouth has healed. That is very fast! For now I can't tell if this is a male or female as I haven't learned the skill to sex a fish.
It is now almost coming to third week, I just replenish the tank with another 30 baby carps. The first batch of baby carps that I put in has been completely consumed and my little snakehead has gained some weight. It now has a small tummy with it's body diameter larger than it's head compared to when I first caught it in the wild. My observation reveals it will surface for air once every 2 to 3 minutes if it exerts energy to chase prey but when it is in passive mode, it stays at the bottom, surfacing once every 5 to 6 minutes to gulp some air.
I will continue to add updates here whenever I come across anything interesting about my pet. For more details and understanding of Chevron Snakeheads, read up on Wikipedia or Fishbase follow the links below.
Channa Striata (Wikipedia)
Channa Striata (Fishbase)
UPDATE 15-October-2014
===================
I have successfully trained my juvenile snakehead to eat fish pellets instead. The way to do this is to buy those saltwater commercial pellets with at least 45% protein mix which is used by fish farmers to raise predatory saltwater fishes like Barramundi.
My Haruan will not immediately grab at the floating pellets but after some time, they will eat it up. This is more hassle free than feeding it with live/dead feed which is costly and troublesome.
Some questions that I had always wanted to know.
(1) How long before it rises to surface for air?
(2) How much would it eat in a day?
(3) What sort of food that it favors?
(4) Where does it spend most of it's time, bottom, mid-water or surface?
(5) How fast does it heal after a hook goes through it's mouth?
(6) How soon would it go back to feeding after injury?
So I took the fish home. Bought a 1.5ft wide tank, installed a small water filter & added some vegetation into the tank. Pour in some rainwater that I had collected overnight and finally put the fish in. I also bought about 30 baby carps as food for the snakehead. One thing to remember though, snakeheads, especially the Chevron Snakehead is a jumper, especially the smaller ones. If you don't secure a roof or netting of some kind over the tank, the fish will jump out.
It has been a week since I kept the snakehead. It has not paid much attention to the baby carps that I put in. Preferring to stay at the bottom most of the time, it probably still is traumatised after I caught it. The wound caused by hook on it's left mouth has healed. That is very fast! For now I can't tell if this is a male or female as I haven't learned the skill to sex a fish.
It is now two weeks after I put it into the aquarium. The wound on it's mouth has fully recovered and has started feeding. I did a rough count on those baby carps, there are at least 10 missing. Somebody has been busy munching on carps haven't we? I went to check on the tank again after a weekend outstation, coming back on Sunday night, there was only 2 carps left. At this rate, I can roughly assess a Chevron Snakehead will eat about 5 to 8 baby carps a day at juvenile stage. It probably needs that much protein to grow.
I will continue to add updates here whenever I come across anything interesting about my pet. For more details and understanding of Chevron Snakeheads, read up on Wikipedia or Fishbase follow the links below.
Channa Striata (Wikipedia)
Channa Striata (Fishbase)
UPDATE 15-October-2014
===================
I have successfully trained my juvenile snakehead to eat fish pellets instead. The way to do this is to buy those saltwater commercial pellets with at least 45% protein mix which is used by fish farmers to raise predatory saltwater fishes like Barramundi.
My Haruan will not immediately grab at the floating pellets but after some time, they will eat it up. This is more hassle free than feeding it with live/dead feed which is costly and troublesome.
0 Response to "Aquarium Project - Common Snakehead"
Post a Comment