Loaches Online Forum

New loaches can have trouble adapting from shipping & to your tank. It can be from stress, disease, parasites, different foods or water parameters. It's hard to say. Did you see them eat? What signs did they display? What was their shipping or lfs water vs your tank & tap water? Red streaks? White s...

Any time you have fish twice the size of others there can be problems. Especially if they like similar foods. A 4+ inch fish eats more than twice as much as a 2 inch fish.

I keep both my BN pleco & hillstream loaches in unheated tanks here in warm-ish California... but not together.

I did a major weeding of my "riverish" tank yesterday & saw 1 of the male sewellia's fins are pretty chewed. I have them with leopard danios, gastromyzons & a stiphodon goby. The danios compete for food but I've never seen them nip at the loaches. The sewellias do scuffle at times, usually males cha...

A very good post by redshark! I would like to see the test results for ammonia, nitrite & nitrate. Stressed out fish will not likely eat well if at all.

Often LFS will test your tank water for free if you don't have an API kit yet. Try to get actual numbers, not just ok.

You know, I prefer a BN pleco to otocinclus. They're much hardier than the often times delicate otos & big enough not to be a big fish snack. I have a L144 pleco female. She's a pretty gold color & seems to do her "job" of eating algae...& gets some leftover food too. I like regular brown BNs but am...

So how are thing coming Fran? I've lost track of which thread is the current 1...but I want to know...

Black beard algae IS an alga (a so called "red" alga); it's cyanobacteria that's not. It can be confusing: BBA vs BGA (blue green "alga" is really a bacteria). Almost no fish eat BGA,; a few will graze on BBA, but not enough to remove it all. The causes of both are difficult to pinpoint with any cer...

I think Mr. Slim is much more filled out, he looks great! & Ms. Not So Slim looks fine too. Clowns live a long time, they may or may not grow at the same rate; gender? stunting? water quality? parasites? It's hard to say. We do the best we can for our fish as we can & know better. You're doing fine!...

Your tank & fish look great, Fran! Clowns can be slow to adjust to a new tank. I bet it's more with just the 2. It's only been 3+ weeks, give them some time...

So, it's been 3 weeks or so...how are things going now, Fran?

Give them some time to adjust, Fran. You know you need a few more & couple hiding spots.

I'm not a fan of loach/cichlid tanks; different continents, different territory needs...I thought your silver dollars were enough for this tank, beside more loaches, of course.

I've had several females of several species look to be carrying eggs. It doesn't seem to harm them to be so full of eggs, except they are often slower swimming (think chubby jogger, lol). My females were often the "alpha" fish in their species group(s). Your fatter loach should be fine.

Hey Fran, I'm thinking your pudgy clown might be female. They are usually both "taller" & wider than slimmer males. I agree with redshark, females often carry eggs & males probably "can" fertilize them...with the right environment cues...whatever those may be. But we as hobbyists hopefully can find ...

Oh, yeah, MDF won't be a long term stand...a friend built a lovely oak stand for our 5ft 110g/ 120g...right before we moved to CA...We're not sure how long we can stay here, so we've never set it up. It was supposed to be a discus tank...but I no longer have the impetus to make it happen. Yes! Do th...

The first 2 look to be about the size of pool filter sand, fine for loaches but does move around some. I prefer the Sunset Gold color, pool sand is pretty much white & shows everything. I have had pool sand in several tanks as a "budget minded" substrate but wish it wasn't so light in color. I love ...