Clown Loachs

[sara213]

I have three clown loachs I had a castle in my aquarium(I know corny) but I liked it at the time i bought it. anyhow...as you know with those ornaments are hollow and the clown loachs used to swim all the way up to the top of the turret and they stay there. I think the last two i had died because they didn't come down to eat. so a few hours ago I decided to remove the castle al together and i put in its place a terracotta pot on its side.

I bought maybe 1 week ago 6 baby angels and two clown loachs. I found that the smallest clown wasn't eating (it seemed) it would swim to the top and vertically stay there swiming on the top back and forth. I finally decided to isolate him in a another tank so that way there is no other competitors (baby angels because you know they can be like pigs and hog all the food) he is already weak I figure he is close to going but I'm hoping he wont. I put a table spoon of aquarium salt in the tank and i'm going to do a water change tomorrow. Is there a way you can make him eat again? or is he just going to starve to death?

they are not cheap fish either...><

 

[simonas]

you can;t make him eat but I know from experience and I have 4 now that clown loaches are very greedy.
They can also come out at night if shy mine have come out there shell now but it tool a while
Buy some frozen brine shrimp with garlic and feed when lights out, I;d be extremely surprised if they don;t eat then

 

[sara213]

you can;t make him eat but I know from experience and I have 4 now that clown loaches are very greedy.
They can also come out at night if shy mine have come out there shell now but it tool a while
Buy some frozen brine shrimp with garlic and feed when lights out, I;d be extremely surprised if they don;t eat then

You can buy brine shrimp with garlic? I did not know that...I will see if i can find some.

I think it is only the one clown that I have that did not eat. the other two are very active. the one Isolated from the main tank.

 

[sara213]

RIP small clown loach

down to two. I definitely think it was the castle's fault (lol, not that i'm blaming the castle. It is my fault because i put it in there. but then again i wasn't thinking about getting clown loachs a few months ago.)

I'm not going to buy another clown loach though.

 

[onebto]

A Clown Loach will eat when it wants from what I have read and experienced the only time a Clown loach will not eat is :

1. Its stuck and cannot get to the food this happens with some ornaments that have smaller and smaller sections to them I find the best way of dealing with this is to fill up the small danger areas with filter sponge and I would recommend you take a close look at any new purchases and air on the side of caution if you think there is no way a Clown can get in there then they probably can but they may have trouble getting out.

2. If a Clown is sick if in doubt observe the Loach and notice any symptoms marks etc then go to the fish emergency section of this forum fill out the questions in a new post and someone will pick your post up pretty quick.

3. Stress which is a huge subject stress can be caused by a huge number of things like infections or diseases to water conditions to lack of numbers Clown Loach are a VERY social species and they NEED to be with there own kind 4 to 5 minimum, it seems odd but one thing that helps is having lots of hiding places the more you have the less they hide.

Simonas eluded to the natural nature of Clowns to feed when the lights are out. Mine feed during the day but they do eat alot more when my moon phase lighting comes on and when its dark.

As I mentioned in your other post you have some issues to consider if you want to keep healthy Clown Loach, but as you said you are not going to get any more loach so in that case you should consider the best welfare of your current loach, and that would be to re home him with someone who has a healthy group of Clown Loaches to just keep one or two in my humble opinion is not fare on the loach.

Regards onebto.

 

[sara213]

A Clown Loach will eat when it wants from what I have read and experienced the only time a Clown loach will not eat is :

1. Its stuck and cannot get to the food this happens with some ornaments that have smaller and smaller sections to them I find the best way of dealing with this is to fill up the small danger areas with filter sponge and I would recommend you take a close look at any new purchases and air on the side of caution if you think there is no way a Clown can get in there then they probably can but they may have trouble getting out.

2. If a Clown is sick if in doubt observe the Loach and notice any symptoms marks etc then go to the fish emergency section of this forum fill out the questions in a new post and someone will pick your post up pretty quick.

3. Stress which is a huge subject stress can be caused by a huge number of things like infections or diseases to water conditions to lack of numbers Clown Loach are a VERY social species and they NEED to be with there own kind 4 to 5 minimum, it seems odd but one thing that helps is having lots of hiding places the more you have the less they hide.

Simonas eluded to the natural nature of Clowns to feed when the lights are out. Mine feed during the day but they do eat alot more when my moon phase lighting comes on and when its dark.

As I mentioned in your other post you have some issues to consider if you want to keep healthy Clown Loach, but as you said you are not going to get any more loach so in that case you should consider the best welfare of your current loach, and that would be to re home him with someone who has a healthy group of Clown Loaches to just keep one or two in my humble opinion is not fare on the loach.

Regards onebto.

Hi!

I'm feeling more confident now with the two loachs that are remaining...I probably will acquire another three when I get the 55 gallon up and running.

it is almost ready... I have set up a blog about setting up my 55 gallon tank. Just because I wanted to do a blog for so long and didn't know what to do it about.