Aggressive Rostrata?

[fain]

I had a spot of trouble this morning with my Rostrata. He's about 3" now and has always been a bit... rambunctious. He will often snatch the food away from other fish like they aren't there and get much too close for the liking of my more retiring fish. This morning however, was very unusual for him. When the lights turned on, I saw that he was grayed out and breathing heavy. I was worried that he was sick until I saw why. He was chasing my other loaches! He'd single a Striata out and just chase it relentlessly. Whenever he got close enough he would try to nose them, or bite at them. If another loach came by, he'd target them instead. He was even chasing 3 Striata at once! They weren't fighting or playing, I could tell that much. The Striata wanted nothing to do with him. I thought he might just have been grumpy, or hungry so I fed them and he seems to have quieted down, but I didn't actually see him come out and eat.

Are Rostrata normally this aggressive, or was he just in a bad mood?

Thoughts?

[DainBramage1991]

Is he the only rostrata in your tank, or are there others of the same species in there with him?

My thinking is that perhaps he's acting aggressive because he's alone. Maybe if he had several other rostratas to interract with he might settle down and be nicer to your other loaches.

Another thought I had: do you have any dither fish in your tank? Loaches seem to be calmed somewhat by the presence of other fish swimming around. I have a small school of white skirt tetras performing that role in my loach tank, but I've heard a lot of other folks like to use danios.

[fain]

Frustratingly, he is the only Rostrata. When I bought him he looked like a young Kubotai. I was sure that I would be able to pick up some friends for him within a month as Kubotai are readily available at Petsmart now. Well...he ended up being a Rostrata and I haven't seen another since. The same thing happened with my 4 Histrionica. (I'm still waiting for them to be available again.) Had I known it was a Rostrata, I probably wouldn't have bought him just because they simply aren't available in my area.

I work at the lfs that the Rostrata and Histrionica came from so I've been keeping an eye out, but we only get Striata (rarely), Yoyos, Clowns and Sids(virtually never, but we have a bunch because we never sell any).

I have a Betta, 2 Electric Blue Rams, 1 Oto cat and 2 young Discus. I'm thinking on picking up Neons or Cardinals next month, but the Rams are very bold and the loaches seem very comfortable with milling around all day. They don't exactly eat out of my hands, but they certainly don't seem to be skittish.

He might be unhappy because he is the only Rostrata, but if that is the case, then I'm sunk. He came in with the Yoyos by mistake, so I don't think I'll be seeing any more.

[plaalye]

Sounds like normal territorial battle to me. It's claiming the tank and will to take on all comers. I had a striata that was like that until the Histrionicas and kubotai got too big to push around. IMO, you already have fish that shouldn't really be together in the tank(betta, discus, rams, botias) and cardinals/neons will add to the confusion. You may be in for more trouble.

[LoachOrgy]

all my rostrata are very aggressive compared to striatas and clowns. He needs some buddies. But all my rostratas do is fight the entire time. IN a good way. Although I think I may have lost one last year due to a mortal fighting wound from an eye barb is my likely guess.

Pets mart has actually been selling what they call yoyo loaches but are actually rostratas. That may be something to look at. Also, pet supermarket has been getting some very nice, large loaches recently and they are able to order them for you if there is one near you. I don't like going to these larger fish store chains but out of all of the chains, pet supermarket takes care of the fish the best in this area. Worth a look at least.