Elassoma zonatum - The Banded Pygmy Sunfish

Banded pygmy sunfish, Elassoma zonatum, are a small freshwater fish found in North America.  They range from North Carolina to Florida west to Texas and north to Indiana and Illinois.  Like most Elassoma species, they inhabit swampy slow moving waters with plenty of aquatic vegetation.  Not true sunfish, they’re in their own family, Elassomatidae, with the other species of Elassoma.

E. zonatum is probably the least colorful species in the genus, but they are still attractive despite their drab coloration.  Both sexes are grey to tan and have vertical bars on their bodies.  Males tend to be darker, have more pronounced bands, and have dark fins whereas the female has relatively clear fins.  My females are slightly larger and more robust looking.  Males can get some very subdued blue iridescence, but you really have to look for it to find it.    

My fish are from Texas and were collected by Brian Perkins of WildPERU.  I received a group of 6 in late December and set them up in a 5 gallon tank with a huge clump of java moss.  I lost 2 in the first week, but they settled in well and turned out to be 1 male and 3 females.  Water was kept about 225 ppm hardness and 75°F.  They hide quite a bit, but not so much as to be hard to find.  They come out readily for food or to explore the tank but spend their resting time in hiding.  E. zonatum tends to stay near the bottom of the tank, but will explore mid water to find food. 

So far they don’t seem inclined to take flakes or granules.  They will pick at Repashay foods a bit.  I feed them mostly frozen bloodworms, frozen tubifex, blackworms, white worms, grindal worms, and baby brine shrimp.  They have good appetites and will eat quite a bit. 

I wasn’t 100% sure I had any males in early January, so I slowly lifted the moss out to find the adults.  My curiosity was answered by the very large number of miniscule fry dropping out of the moss as I lifted it through the water.  I didn’t need to ask Brian to bring any males to the January meeting; I obviously had males and females.  At this point I moved the adults to a 2.5 gallon tank with a spawning mop for cover while I cleaned out and set up a 20 gallon to house them permanently. 

Fry are very small, maybe only slightly larger than tetra fry.  I’m pretty sure I found them newly hatched, I didn’t come across any free-swimming fry for another week.  I started feeding them on 50-100 micron Golden Pearls and microworms.  After about a week I started them on baby brine shrimp.  For such small fry, they grow fairly quickly.  Once they got to be about 1/8” I started doing 80% water changes every week using aged tap water.  Most fry are growing at a fairly constant rate, but there is a small number that are absolutely huge.  Most are about ¼”, but a few are ½” or a little bigger.  I’m not sure why this is.  I’m not sure that it’s a simple matter of males growing faster, as that’s a much bigger difference than I normally experience with other species.  

Good tank mates would be other small fishes that inhabit the upper regions of the aquarium.  I’m now keeping them with Epiplatys annulatus, the clown killifish.  It seems to work well as the killies stay at the surface and the sunfish stay near the bottom.  A small mid-water schooling fish would be an excellent addition too.  While a little picky about what they will eat, Elassoma zonatum have been overall easy to keep and would make excellent candidates for nano tanks or planted setups.