For the past year, Cornilius, our pet Mbu (Tetraodon Mbu) Puffer and Shadow, our Tiger Plecostomus, have been living in relative peace and harmony in our forty gallon tank. I noticed a few months ago however that Cornilius had begun nipping some of Shadow's fins. This was a clear sign that territory was becoming a concern. I took action by adding a cave ornament to the tank so that Shadow could have a place to take refuge. Unfortunately, this did not work out as well as I had expected it to. Shadow continued to suffer wounds inflicted by Cornilius.

I decided next to buy a new five gallon tank just for Shadow. Unfortunately, it seems I acted too slowly as Shadow died a day after moving him to his new tank. Shadow had survived through every single phase of our tank and had survived when other fish could not. I was certain that he'd be with us a very long time. He would have lived on if only I had the good sense of moving him much sooner.

Beyond the fact that Tiger Plecos are rare, they also grow to a maximum length of about five inches unlike most other plecs which never seem to stop growing. Best of all, Shadow was the first fish of ours that Michelle ever took a real interest in. Michelle was only about six months old when she learned his name. She would routinely seek him out in our tank and always enjoyed feeding him. So, replacing Shadow was an absolute must.

I checked every single tropical fish store in my local vicinity and had no luck finding the ever rare Tiger Pleco. I did manage to stumble upon some even rarer baby Mbu Puffers. An amazing sight I never thought I'd ever see.

Instead of wasting more time and effort searching I decided to order a Tiger Pleco through one of the on-line tropical fish merchants. Fortunately, fish2u.com had Tiger Plecos in stock and I soon arranged for an overnight UPS delivery.

Shadow II arrived on Friday afternoon in a very well padded box. As soon as we removed his bag from the box Michelle right away pointed to him and recognized him as Shadow. Though he was much smaller than the original Shadow and had far more fins Michelle was still very happy to see him "again".

All in all, the on-line purchasing route turned out for the better. Shadow II has a great color and looks very healthy despite what was probably a bumpy trip. Usually I'd really try to avoid buying tropical fish through this method but I really had no choice. This was indeed another Millan fish emergency that worked out fine in the end. ;-)