Dwarf Neon Praecox Rainbowfish (Melanotaenia praecox), Tank-Bred
- Low stock - 8 items left
- Backordered, shipping soon
* For the safety of our animals, we now ship live fish exclusively via UPS Next Day Air. If your order contains this item, you will only see UPS Next Day Air as a shipping option during checkout *
The Dwarf Neon Praecox Rainbowfish (Melanotaenia praecox) is one of the most popular and colorful rainbowfish species. It lives in very large schools in areas with dense vegetation, so it is an ideal candidate for the planted aquarium and appreciates floating plants in its habitat. As an adult, this rainbowfish's body features iridescent scales in several different shades of blue, accented with bright red fins. As with most rainbowfish, mature males display the brightest coloration, particularly while competing/posturing with other males. Females also possess the same attractive coloration, but to a lesser extent.
The Dwarf Neon Praecox Rainbowfish is generally peaceful with other fish species of similar size, but smaller shrimp fry may fall prey. Its mouth and throat are relatively small for its body size, so it might be possible to keep it with adult dwarf shrimp. All other invertebrates (including larger Amano, Bamboo, and Vampire Shrimp) should be compatible with no problems.
The most intense color will be displayed when this fish kept in schools of 6 or more (including multiple males) in a heavily planted, spacious aquarium to ensure that subdominant males are not overly harassed by dominant males. As with many rainbowfish, darker substrate will also often result in better coloration. The Dwarf Neon Praecox Rainbowfish is very easy to feed and will accept most high quality dry foods, but also requires various frozen and live foods in its diet for optimal health and coloration.
- Active, schooling community fish that thrives in planted aquariums
- Compatible with many invertebrates
- Adults display brilliant red and blue coloration
- Active and easy to feed
- Temperature: 73° - 82° F (23° - 28° C), although 72° - 82° F is optimal
- pH: 6.8 - 7.5
- KH: 8 - 12 dKH
- Minimum tank size: 20 gallons
- Diet: Omnivorous. High quality dry foods will be accepted, but should be supplemented often with small, meaty frozen and live foods.
- Social behavior: Schooling/shoaling, should be kept in as large of groups as possible. Dominant males may attack or kill subdominant males in small aquariums. Peaceful with most other comparably-sized fish.
- Origin: Tank-bred, but indigenous to New Guinea, Indonesia.
- Average adult size: 2.5 - 3.2 inches (6.4 - 8 cm)
- Average purchase size: .5 - 1 inch (1.2 - 2.5 cm)
For the safety of our animals, we only ship live fish, crabs, and select other inverts exclusively via UPS 1 Day Air. If your order contains this item, you will only see UPS 1 Day Air as a shipping option during checkout. If other items are in your cart that can ship with 2 day or standard shipping options the only shipping method you can still select is UPS 1 Day Air.
UPS 1 Day is a description of the duration of time a shipment will spend in transit once it has been shipped. This does not guarantee the package will be shipped the same or next day from which the order was placed.
Shipping Schedule for this service
Current Handling Time:
1-9 business days
Here at Aquatic Arts, we consider the welfare of the live animals we are shipping to be of the foremost importance. This process is much more involved than simply creating a shipping label and affixing it to a box. Depending on the order, it takes from 4 to 7 people to complete this process properly. We check the weather conditions here where they fly out of the Indianapolis UPS facility and the destination for each shipment. We start early each morning and go through a multi-step process to have the day's shipments prepared in time for the UPS pickup. The volume of orders in our system also affects the processing time. Therefore our stated handling time is 1-9 business days.
Shipping Rate
Pricing is by size of package needed to fill entire order and distance it must travel. It will be calculated at checkout.