If you are going to set up an aquarium with tropical fish, you can certainly think of the Serpae tetra as a good addition. They are also called Blood Caracinos because of their color.
They are famous for their bright red color. Sometimes you can find them in reddish brown color. Another important feature is a black spot behind their gills. It is prominent when they are young, but will shrink when they get older.
They are native to the Amazon River basin. They are famous for their elegant and compressed shape. They can grow up to 2.5 inches. You can easily distinguish between a male and a female by their shapes. The females are round in shape.
If you want to bring them in for your aquarium, you must plant your aquarium very heavily. They love to live in an environment full of plants. Although they can tolerate lower temperatures, they can be happy in a wide range of 65 to 85°F. They want to live in still water, so you should not create flows or currents in the aquarium.
It is not necessary to make any special effort for its care and feeding. They can eat all kinds of food, including flake food, live food, frozen food, or dry food. In the open nature, they often feed on various types of insects and worms found in the water. Most of them will also try to test the available plants. Since they are not large, even if you provide them with quality food, your food budget will not be extraordinary.
They can live in peace with almost all other species, but you should avoid neon tetras with them. Serpae tetras will not be able to face them.
Serpae tetra fish will always swim in the middle of the tank or sometimes on the bottom so they don’t disturb the other species in the tank. However, they will play with each other throughout the day.
Breeding Serpae tetra fish is very easy. If you switch and a pair of males and females in a separate small tank with lots of plants, they will lay small eggs that are transparent. They like to lay eggs on the leaves of plants, so place some large-leaved plants in the breeding tank. In this small tank, you must put dark substrate and that tank must be kept out of direct sunlight. The eggs will hatch in about a day and the young will start eating from day one. Brine shrimp can be an ideal food for them. You can also feed them powdered flake food. They will grow very quickly if you feed them live food.
You should always keep them in a group of at least five. They are educating the fish, but they can become aggressive the moment you feed them. At that point, they will try to compete with each other and in the process may damage their friends’ ends. If you want to keep them with other species, you must see that all the fish in the aquarium are the same size. If you introduce species with different sizes in a tank, there will always be internal fights.
I will recommend Serpae Tetra fish in a community tank for their brilliant red color which is remarkable and their habit of staying in the middle or bottom of the tank.
