Heros sp . ' Rotkeil ' AKA Red headed severum

I am doing some reading on this neat looking fish. Was wondering if anyone has experience with them? And ultimately may want to pick a couple up if anyone local has any for sale.

Neat fish if you want to switch from your beautiful planted tank to a desolated wasteland of shredded greenage.   

I really like them. I haven't personally owned them, but I have stopped to watch them a few times at a place for pets and down in the Wetspot once.

Not sure how they go as personality wise, but I've had a couple of other types of severums...... I'd place them in the very mild mannered section of cichlids .....

Their breeding colors look amazing( from the pictures I've looked at too)

Ive only kept a gold severum and it was able to hold its own with a big Oscar, a true parrot and it even kept my pearsei in check. It was pretty easy going for one of the 'big' cichlids.

Exactly dmd! My green severum and also my mouth brooding one both lived just fine with some larger cichlids, though I don't think they would do very well with jags, Dovii, festae, umbee, etc.....

In reading this fish isn't a true severum even though the name could lead us to believe so.

One of the details that seem to contradict each other in reading is about plants. Some people say they don't eat plants but fish profiles say they do. I do like severums but if they eat plants or dig I won't be able to house them.

Though I have seen exceptions, most sev's I've seen or kept were pretty voracious plant eaters. Sometimes even the tough stuff like anubias or java fern isn't safe. That being said, I've seen some that were kept in planted tanks and behaved themselves ... but given how much cash and effort you've put into your plants, I wouldn't risk it if it were me.

My theory is that when someone works on the Heros genus, turquoise severums will get reestablished as a separate species (they used to be H. appendiculatus but Kullander collasped them into the greens, H. efaciatus, despite being different adult sizes, different breeding color patterns, and being hundreds of miles apart) from the green and the rotkeil will be a location variant of the turquoise. (Personal opinion only though)

dwarfpike wrote:Though I have seen exceptions, most sev's I've seen or kept were pretty voracious plant eaters. Sometimes even the tough stuff like anubias or java fern isn't safe. That being said, I've seen some that were kept in planted tanks and behaved themselves ... but given how much cash and effort you've put into your plants, I wouldn't risk it if it were me.

My theory is that when someone works on the Heros genus, turquoise severums will get reestablished as a separate species (they used to be H. appendiculatus but Kullander collasped them into the greens, H. efaciatus, despite being different adult sizes, different breeding color patterns, and being hundreds of miles apart) from the green and the rotkeil will be a location variant of the turquoise. (Personal opinion only though)

Very interesting.