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Pics from Uruguay Trip

lonlangione

Members
It's great you not only appreciated the fish but also the country it self. Thanks for sharing. I will watch for more pictures.
 

dogofwar

CCA Members
It's a wonderful place - very different from anywhere I've ever traveled (even other parts of South America)...

Here's a picture of the beach that's a block or two from Felipe's house (at dusk)... Taking a walk on basically my own beach (I didn't see a soul in about 45 mins of walking that night)...folowed by an awesome "asado" dinner with Felipe and his family... is worth the price of admission...

Matt



It's great you not only appreciated the fish but also the country it self. Thanks for sharing. I will watch for more pictures.

Uruguay 623.jpg

Uruguay 529.jpg
 

dogofwar

CCA Members
Good eye, Francine!

The unofficial answer is that it's the prettiest pike that I saw on the trip (I have more pics that I can post on Monday...and none of them do it justice). I'm not really a pike guy but these things knocked my socks off - lots of metallic greens and blues.

The more scientific answer is that it's a pike in the saxatilis group from a small stream along Ruta 7 about 10km from Centurion, Uruguay.

So what is a saxatalis group pike from Uruguay? More science is needed:

The relationships of these species to Crenicichla lepidota (from Rio Guapore, Bolivia) and Crenicichla saxatilis (from Suriname) is unknown. However, the Uruguayan "saxatilis" can be split into two groups according to geographic locality. Herein, I refer to the Rio Uruguay drainage fishes as C. cf. lepidota and the coastal drainage fishes as C. cf. saxatilis.

More here from Ed Burress, who's doing graduate work on the pike of Uruguay (I sat next to him in the van for two weeks last trip): http://edburress.blogspot.com/2010/12/crenicichla-saxatilis-species-group-of.html

We called the (nameless, never collected) stream location, either Cardozo (after David Cardozo, the young gaucho in the pics above, who came to see why a bunch of people were dorking around in the stream (and probably whether any of them were female...sorry dude!) or "Estancia de la casa amarilla" ("ranch with the yellow house") for the estancia owner's beautiful yellow house.

I brought back I think ten 2-3"-ers of the unknown saxatilis-complex pike from "Cardozo" and they're already eating NLS.

We also found a gorgeous, Red-Ceibal-ish (but slightly different) chanchito here (I have a large male and 3 smaller ones) and a really nice super high fin cory (didn't bring any back), among other fish.

Matt

Nice pictures!!

What is this?

 

dogofwar

CCA Members
Unfortunately I hear that they've begun farming Tilapia on one of the man-made lakes formed with the hydroelectric plant...

If you like peacocks, you'll like mouthbrooding Gymnogeophagus (gymnogenys and labiatus). Very similar fish in a lot of ways.

Matt

Beautiful photos, Matt!

Do you think they have any Africans there??! :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::lol:
 

dogofwar

CCA Members
Bringing back fish from the wild is not for the feignt of heart :(

We collected some absolutely beautiful large red and black tetras called Astyanax laticepts from a pond outside of 33. There are no Uruguayan tetras in the hobby, so this was one of my my exciting things to bring back (and I brought back about 10...all made it to my tanks).

Unfortunately, over the last couple of days they developed ick and started dropping like flies. A couple the first day (before any ick was apparent), 3 the next (first signs of ick...and the rest yesterday and today). I heavily salted the tank when they arrived but I guess it wasn't enough. I was doind daily water changes + an herbal ick remedy from Kordon (which is supposed to be safe AKA doesn't work).

Anyway, because they're tetras (and their in a QT tank with cories) I can't use Nox-ick or the like. So I used heat + salt. I guess it was too much, as all of the tetras and a few cories and 2/3 of the mimic otos died. It sucks but it's a good illustration of what's involved in actually bringing back wild fish. These are tough fish and it's not easy (although to go from low-70s/upper 60s native waters to low 70s tank water to upper 80s anti-ick temps is ROUGH).

A couple of tanks (of cichlids) also have some ick (expected)...and I'm treating with traditional ick meds and salt... Only lost a couple of cichlids so far (to aggression in the bag and in the QT tank) but I'm not out of the woods yet!

Matt
 

abarilot

Members
Matt I'm loving the photos! Bummer about losing the tetras and catfish! I lost some of my fish when I came back from the December 2010 trip including 1 Cr. celidochilus and a pair of Cr. minuano :(

I'm looking forward to seeing more photos of the sax pike!
 
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