Captive Care Notes: Hitch (Lavinia, Family Cyprinidae)

It is effectively illegal to collect fishes for home aquaria in California without a scientific collecting permit. One way around the law is to set up and maintain aquaria for schools and nature centers. In some instances, the California Department of Fish and Game may issue scientific collecting permits for educational purposes.

Should you acquire such a permit, then keeping Hitch (Lavinia exilicauda) should pose no special challenge. Their omnivorous diet makes them easy to feed, and they are physiologically adapted to survive a wide variety of conditions. Hitch eggs have been collected from the wild and hatched in laboratory aquaria at 17C (62F) degrees with moderate aeration; it takes newly hatched hitch several days to learn how to swim in a straight line and successfully seek food.