South American bumblebee catfish

[Bobbie]

Hey y’all so I’m currently planning for a 29g long that I’ll hopefully be getting in the next few months, and I’ve become very interested in adding a bumblebee catfish to the tank. 
My questions are: 

- Is a 29g long even large enough for a bumblebee catfish? I’ve read that they can go in a minimum of a 15-20g, but that seems too small to me for most catfish. 

 

- Do they need to have company or are they fine on their own? If they do need their own kind with them, how many and what size tank would be needed for them all to be happy? 

- Would they be alright with some of the larger corydora species, and what shoaling/schooling fish could be added to the upper levels of the tank? Apparently they do well with some barbs, but I thought barbs were aggressive. 
 

 

Thanks for any advice! I’m currently saving up for the tank, and if need be I could save up for longer to get a 40g instead of the 29g but this’ll be my largest tank so I wanna be very sure of what fish I’m getting before I go and buy the tank, stand or any equipment. 

If I don’t have enough space for the bumblebee catfish then I’ll just move my interest to something else. 

[Fish Folk]

Are you looking into getting / keeping Microglanis inheringi? There are some other species that fall under "bumblebee catfish," but this seems to be the best choice.

Here is a fishbone.se webpage with plenty of links to root through and study:

https://www.fishbase.se/summary/Microglanis-iheringi.html

This YouTuber seemed to give helpful explanations, though the video is wanting:

 

 

[Randall from Texas]

I have 3 bumble bee cats in my discus tank. I love all catfish so I have oto, Cory's, a blue eyed lemon pleco, giant oto, and wood cats in quarantine.

The bees only come out at night. They hide all day in caves and under things. They eat ghost shrimp whole now. I have never seen them bother any fish, but when they were in quarantine they did eat all of my guppy fry. They also each have their own hide. They do not like to share caves. So you could do a single. 

The biggest 1 is 3 inch now. They don't need a lot of space but a larger footprint would be better than a taller tank. Bees are more like ambush predators, they are just fine sitting in one spot waiting for food to come to them.

I have neon tetras as my smallest school fish and they don't bother them. Rasboras might be too small. But would be ok probably.

They are super cool, but you'll almost never see them. Get one!