Large Clown Loach Behaviour - Help

[veralyn]

Need some help. We have recently added 3 large clown loaches to our peaceful community tropical fish tank. Initially they showed typical loach behaviour and shyed away for approx 1 week. Then they all appeared to settle in well. We already had one small clown loach in the tank which after approx 1 week seemed to settle with the larger ones. Then disaster, the smaller one died and we assumed the larger loaches had killed him with kindness (we think he suffocated trying to join in with them). One of the larger loaches seemed to like small holes and got himself into a tight fit last week, we eventually had to extract him out of one of the tank ornaments, we plugged up all the holes and things seemed to go back to normal. Then today the loach that kept getting stuck died. We have removed him from the tank but now the remaining two loaches have disappeared. We have looked everywhere, they are nowhere to be seen at feeding times etc? Just wondering if anyone else has had the same experience. There isn't that many places in the tank for them to hide? The large loaches are approx 6" in length.

 

[tribalbrit]

Is your water ok? if yes try tempting them out with some fresh cucumber or some frozen blood worm etc. See if they come out after dark.
They really do need a larger shoal to get the best out of them.

 

[veralyn]

Hi thanks for the response. We did initially have a problem with ammonia levels in the tank (we changed tank after 11 years to a new one at the beginning of the year - anyway long story short we sorted the problem with several water changes and letting the filter system start to work properly). We had the water tested regularly at our local aquatics centre and everything was fine when we introduced the loaches to the tank. I just can't understand where they have gone - the aquatic centre held the three loaches for us for several weeks whilst we sorted the water and I was thinking that it was an act of sympathy or something? Maybe we should introduce some smaller loaches and see what happens? We currently have gouramis, 1 large silver dollar, several swordtails, tetras and mollies. Will keep you posted.

 

[dh058977]

If your tank was just left for a few weeks with a new filter, chances are it wasnt / still isnt cycled properly. What are your actual readings for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate?

I think the most important thing we havent found out yet is the size of your tank?

 

[veralyn]

Hi
Not sure what the ammonia/nitrate readings are/were - this was done by the aquatic centre who confirmed after several weeks and several water changes that everything was ok. Initially they would not let us buy any fish without getting the water right. When we changed tank we put the fish we had in our old tank straight into the new one (with no losses). We checked the PH of the tap water and the new tank water - ph 6.5 / 7.0.
The tank is a juwel trigon 190. The filter system has now been in action for approx 3 and a half months.

 

[big_sw2000]

Hi
Not sure what the ammonia/nitrate readings are/were - this was done by the aquatic centre who confirmed after several weeks and several water changes that everything was ok. Initially they would not let us buy any fish without getting the water right. When we changed tank we put the fish we had in our old tank straight into the new one (with no losses). We checked the PH of the tap water and the new tank water - ph 6.5 / 7.0.
The tank is a juwel trigon 190. The filter system has now been in action for approx 3 and a half months.

Strange a similar thing happens to me with Clown Loach. By far my faviout fish. But if i buy a few new ones, how ever big, my old ones in my tank die within a few weeks. Has happend to me every time. Ive own a Fluval 190 corner tank, its been running for about 3 years now, and have had no trouble with water levels, and no other problems with other fish.
Although i can honestly say none of my clowns dissapered, always found the dead bodies.

Steve

 

[TwoTankAmin]

The odds are great that you spiked the tank with ammonia and nitrite due to the addition of the fish. Clowns are pigs- they can eat and poop a ton. Three 6 inch clown loaches increased your bio load by a factor of several times. This had to create a large cycling spike. You show no test results for what happened after adding the fish.

Clowns love to hide in tight places. Sealing up all these places just added more stress to the situation.

Do the following. Read up on cycling, especially the fish in kind to understand what happened. Then get yourself an ammonia test kit at the very least.

big- get a Q tank and next time put the new clowns through an extended Q period. These fish are all wild caught and when they come in they are likely to be carrying all kinds of stuff from the wild that fish well settled into a tank are not going to have good defences against. Parasites especially are common which is why folks so often have issues with new smaller clowns having wasting disease.