Post
by Mark in Vancouver » Tue Jan 31, 2006 11:03 pm
I have a sad follow up to my "red Myanmar loach" story. My incredibly rare, beautiful little fellow succumbed tonight to who knows what. For nine days he was active in the tank, swimming vigorously into the flow from the filters. He was taking food - I saw him eat both flake and bloodworms, and as the photos show, he was keen on kipping on the filter intakes, so there was good abundant food.
My two smithiis seem at home in this tank, as do the other residents, brook and hillstreams alike.
Last night he took on a pale colour and was inactive for the first time. Later he seemed to get worse. This morning he was not taking food, and pretty lifeless, but tonight I discovered him under a rock, upside-down. He was breathing, but very slowly and he would sink to the bottom if I picked him up.
The priority for me was to give him a quick and painless death and to do a 50% water change. His demise was quite similar to the other sickly fish that I saw in the tank he came out of.
Terribly sorry to lose perhaps my first and last chance to keep H. bilineata. Perhaps they will get another shipment, perhaps some of Dave's fish will turn up. You begin to doubt your ability when these rare ones don't make it.... The downside of loachkeeping, I guess: All the other loaches are healthy and happy, some of them are gravid, it's all going well... Fech.
Your vantage point determines what you can see.
I'm envious.
