Loaches Online Forum

I took this short video clip almost 3 weeks ago when I noticed some unusual behaviour between a pair of Annamia at the shop one evening. I have held back with posting it because the tank was full of 'bits' and I was worried how it would look. Anyway, I have thought about it more, and think it is worth posting.

It was late one evening when we were at the shop doing some of our annual stock take. I was trying to guesstimate the number of each species on the loach system, and noticed that the powerhead in the tank containing the Annamia and Acanthocobitis botia had become blocked and there was no flow coming from it. I should point out at this point that our built-in filtration produces very good flow, but I have extra powerheads in many of the Balitorid tanks to give even more current. I quickly set about removing the protective cage underneath this powerhead which had become clogged with debris, and in doing so a fair bit of muck ended up in the tank, hence my reluctance to post the video (our tanks aren't normally full of bits!). So having sorted the powerhead and given the fish a huge step-up in flow, I resumed my stock take. Literally a couple of minutes later I was about to start counting the fish in a tank not far away from the Annamia tank when two of them caught my eye. They were swimming up into the flow together and twisting round each other. There was quite a bit of general argy bargy, but there was also moments where one fish would appear to nibble the dorsal surface of the other and then they'd swim up into the current together again. I watched this for a good 10 minutes (didn't want to move and frighten them) before I decided I had to try and get my camera to record some of it. I crept back with it and took the following short clip which shows some of this behaviour. Unfortunately a lot of the quality seems to have been lost with the photobucket hosting, my original shows much more detail. (Please turn the sound down to avoid hearing my camera refocusing):

http://s88.photobucket.com/albums/k183/ ... CN0412.flv

This is different to usual Annamia squabblings, and I feel the sudden dramatic increase in flow (not sure how long the powerhead had been clogged for) triggered them off.

Apologies again for all the bits, but as I said, I had literally just cleaned the powerhead cage and restarted it when this behaviour started, so there was no real time for the tank to clear.

Emma

Well, I'm not an expert, but I would say that there is definitely something going on there. Very interesting to watch.

I would say...CHECK THE FILTER!!!
It looks like they might be getting a little amorous to me. Their behavior reminds me a bit of the Sewellia love dance.

Looks like hanky panky to me.

shari2 wrote:Looks like hanky panky to me.

Seconded.

Doesn't that remind you of Liniparhomaloptera disparis behaviour Jim? The slimmer one appears to sometimes be rubbing its chin on the nape area of the fatter one. This is very like L.disparis.

For some sort of aggressive behaviour I would expect to see more tail-slapping and vigorous pushing and shoving. This looks more erotic.

Be just like Emma to have them spawn in a shop stock tank. The lady has "fish fingers" similar to having a "green thumb"

Martin.

Alas this tank is part of a centrally filtered system and there is no way of checking through all of the various huge filters we use. It makes me want to bring some of these home into a tank set up with moderate flow and have extra powerheads ready to turn on at some point to simulate what happened there. But there is no more room at the inn... Not unless I turn the old 'office area' (where the computer used to be) in the single story part of the house into a fish room. I have secret plans!

Emma

Martin wrote:

Doesn't that remind you of Liniparhomaloptera disparis behaviour Jim?

Yes, it does. I guess we can expect similar spawning behavior in different hillstream species.

Emma Turner wrote:Alas this tank is part of a centrally filtered system and there is no way of checking through all of the various huge filters we use. It makes me want to bring some of these home into a tank set up with moderate flow and have extra powerheads ready to turn on at some point to simulate what happened there. But there is no more room at the inn... Not unless I turn the old 'office area' (where the computer used to be) in the single story part of the house into a fish room. I have secret plans!

Emma

Sounds like a plan to me

How many tanks do you have at home? It would be interesting to see if they will do that again in a different tank.

Barracuda518 wrote:How many tanks do you have at home? It would be interesting to see if they will do that again in a different tank.

Three main tanks (the big clown tank, the River Tank and a corner Brook Tank for some Schistura), plus one temporary baby tank for the Sewellia fry. But our house is quite narrow and it'd be impossible to fit anything else into our living room what with having these 4 tanks, which is why I'm now focusing my attention on another room, which is currently just used as a bit of a junk room.

Emma

Nice video Emma!

What is it with you and Vietnamese Loaches

Just did a 33% water change on the River-Tank and my biggest Vanmanenia and one of the slimmer ones started exactly this behaviour. It went on for a couple of minuites then they parted.

Martin.

Good luck, Martin!

Cool!!! Let's hope its what it sounds like.

In 2000 my house sufered an ice storm and lost power for 4 days. When the power was restored and the system came up I had a flurry of similar activity in many species besides loaches. I went down to see how many I had lost or would lose and .....instead found out it caused a baby boom. Just when you think you know fish they prove you wrong. I kept the fish warm by filling a big stock tank in the middle of my fish room with water from my gas fired water heater for the 4 days but I was losing some temp by the end. My tanks actually helped maintain 65' upstairs in my house. I have a generator now for this now as that is way to much stress.