THAT"S IMPOSSIBLE!

[scott]

i just found this fish inside the filter (emporer 280 bio wheel) of my 30 gal tank. i'll take a better pic once it's in a tank. i have to set up a spare 5gal i have so it can have a real home. the strangest part is the only fish that have been in that tankl for more than a year are a pair of jackdempsey's and a couple giant danios. this fish is neither. it's obviously a juvinile cichlid of some kind. i will try to keep him alive and let it heal(the impeller must have hit him)and grow then maybe i can id it. oh yeah the filter has a sponge on the intake so it can't suck up the baby dempsey's. pretty stange isn't it.

http://img1.uploadimages.net/thumbs/tn_927330DSC01131.JPG (http://www.uploadimages.net/show.php?img=927330DSC01131.JPG)

[scott]

it's a female apisto i'm not sure what species. i really have no idea where it came from. maybe an egg came in on a plant? i can't think of anything else

[Apistt_ed]

WoW! :o The fish from nowhere! sounds like a great little short story! hahaha! let us know what it is when it's acclimated. post pictures too!

[Alex]

I have pulled, Checkered Barb (2), Platys (1), Cories (2), an unidentified crustacean (1) and lots of snails from my canister filters.

Alex

[scott]

where did they come from? in the tank that i pulled this fish from the filter i have never housed apistogrammas of any kind. in fact the only apistos i have ever housed in any of my tanks are cacs(DR, TR, OF. YG), borellis, baenchi(inca50), eremnopyge(fresa) and agasizzi and i can't be 100% sure because the fish i found is female(and young) but it doesn't seem to be any of these species. oh yeah almost forgot, i had a couple A. steelblue but gave them to my grampy for his 40 gal cumminity

[cdawson]

we'd need a much bigger picture to be able to tell for sure what species it is. Try and get a good close up picture (I know it's difficult, but until then we can't be sure).

[aspen]

it is tough to see what kind of fish that is, but any fish that comes from an egg could theoretically get into the filter, and could also easily have come from a plant you bought. grow it out, give it a tank of it's own and name it 'lucky'.

rick

[LyreTail]

played with the image in my photosoftware but still could not clarify it enough - definately a Cichlid and I would guess a Jack over anything else

[scott]

it's grown a bit since then. it's a female apisto, possibly a cac. i have a number of tanks with cac fry. it must have stowed away in some cleaning tool i guess. sorry about the crappy pics but my camera isn't good at taking aquarium pics i got i mainly for taking pics of my kids.

[scott]

i solved the mystery! it's a female cac, and she just laid eggs 2 days after being put with a yg male.