My Lovely Echidna Rhodhocilus (white-cheeked Brackish Water Moray Eel

Greetings! This is my first post in Fishlore.Com forum.

Not long ago I get myself a lovely Echidna Rhodhocilus, the White-Cheeked Moray Eel, which are common in Java Sea, Indonesia. I got my eel from a guy who fished it out of Muara Tawar estuary in North BekasI city.

This is my eel in person:

It is a brackish water eel that could live for some time in freshwater. Only 30 cms in length, making it one of the smallest amongst morays, and certainly the smallest amongst "freshwater" morays, as other "freshwater" moray species such as Gymnothorax Tile and Gymnothorax Polyuranodon are much bigger and longer than this one.

I am aware that outside of Indonesia, when people think of "freshwater" moray eel, they are thinking of Gymnothorax Tile, which are really a marine eel which sometimes travel to brackish and freshwater temporarily, but are commonly sold as "freshwater" in the West.

I'd love to hear from other forum members who had experiences in keeping Echidna Rhodhocilus, or any other types of "freshwater" & brackish water morays.

Thank you very much in advance!

 

Top view of the eel & its food (river shrimps)

 

Additional info: Many local fishkeepers here has been successful in keeping both Echidna Rhodochilus and Gymnothorax Polyuranodon in "freshwater" environment. I say "freshwater" because what they do is that they keep the eels in the water which came from the river or the lake where they were caught. Since I never did any salinity test (I don't have a hydrometer) on their waters, I assumed that their waters are brackish, or at least low-end brackish (not quite freshwater).

 

Additional info: I have bought three more Echidna Rhodochiluses. I wrote my experiences in this article here:

Freshwater Moray Page - house of haryo

 

Update: I finally get a hydrometer. The readings on my aquarium is 1.008 sg, which means my aquarium water is low-end brackish (about the environment of a river several kilometers from the estuarium. Already brackish but not as brackish as on rivermouth).

 

More update: I finally able to teach two of my echidna rhodochilus to eat frozen shrimps. So it really does took months to adapt them to aquarium life.

 

I add a Gymnothorax Polyuranodon to my collection.

It get along with the Echidnas quite well, thanks God.




G. Polyuranodon are not difficult to be persuaded to eat. Just hours into my aquarium, it already hunted my feeder shrimps.

 

Great information about these fish. Thankyou so much. This will be of great interest to those who are interested in these fascinating fish.

My brother was wrongly sold G. tile as a freshwater fish.

 

Great information about these fish. Thankyou so much. This will be of great interest to those who are interested in these fascinating fish.

My brother was wrongly sold G. tile as a freshwater fish.

You are much welcome, and sorry for the late reply.

Gymnothorax Tile can be kept in freshwater, I know people who successfully did just that, in Indonesia. Maybe because most of those who kept it, uses the water from the river where they are caught (and they were caught here So it might work here, but we cannot guarantee the same results in other countries.

But even here it is not recommended, why risking the health of the eel. Just adding a little seawater will be enough for awhile & it will not hurt the bacterias on the filters. G. Tile will do fine in 1.005 - 1.008 sg (low-end brackish) as long as the water quality are good & the aerators and the powerhead are working well.

Right now in my 1.008 sg tank there are several types of morays, all caught in brackish and freshwater: Echidna Rhodochilus, Gymnothorax Polyuranodon, and a small moray which we are not sure yet about the ID, it might be an Uropterygius Micropterus, or a Gymnothorax Richardsonii. All are doing fine in low-end brackish for quite some time, they are eating well & swimming happily around when it's dark (not so cave-bound) so I have no plan to raise the salinity.

 

Thanks for the vid. They are very interesting snakes.

Just joking, I know they are fish.

The G. tile didn't feed so he took it back.

Research is easier now.

 

Thanks for the vid. They are very interesting snakes.

Just joking, I know they are fish.

The G. Tile didn't feed so he took it back.

Research is easier now.

actually, morays do resemble snakes not only in form but also in behavior. One thing I observed, if they eat a hearty meal, they will take a long time to digest their food & be interested in eating again. My echidna rhodochilus once ate several pieces of frozen shrimps, which I thought are bigger than its head, but it could open its jaw very wide, wider than we thought it is capable of. Just like a snake. Then afterwards it refused food for two weeks

 

Just info, once you taught a Gymnothorax Polyuranodon to eat bloodworms, it will prefer the worm to other food. Here's mine ignoring the guppies and go straight to the worms

 

Vacuum cleaner !

 

Would love to get one, but not easily available around here :/ I am still looking. Gadgets are tricky to get where I live; took me about 3 months to get even a simple thing such as a hydrometer :/