Neon Tetras

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royboy

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I was told that Neons where a placid fish, but then why do mine seem to be fighting all the time? at least thats what it looks like there doing.or am I mistaking this for some kind of play.( I have six at the moment) none have been injured yet, but to me it seems like there fighting.
Also they seem to go berserk when I turn off the aquarium light, they dash about the tank, like mad things,even though room light is on, although they do settle down after awhile.
Royboy
 
Neons will establish a pecking order - that is normal, in fact most schooling fish will do that, unless damage becomes apparent, don't worry about it.

The lights going off suddenly is a suprise to them, in the wild, a sudden darkening would often indicate a shadow of a large predator or something, hence the flight response - instinct. If there are plenty of plants for them to dart into, they are less likely to injure themselves colliding with objects whilst partially blinded, (there eyes take a while to adapt to the new light level).
 
my neons do that too. i was worried at first that they were fighting but none of them are injured so i guess it's natural
 
Thanks for your help Lateral, My neons have got plenty of plants in the tank if they need to hide. and like Aquarius I can't see any injuried fish either.
Is there any item on the market especially for dimming the aquarium light so that it don't go off suddenly,?
I know you can get dimmer switches for domestic use (I have one) but how about for aquariums, or don't they make them because most aquarium lights are worked on dimmer switches?.
 
I think with time your fish will get used to the light going on and off. I try to make sure i have room lights on before turning on the aquarium light but at night i just shut off all lights including the aquarium.

In the beginning I saw similar behavior from my neons but not any more. I believe they have adjusted. Just turn off room lights first...maybe it gets them ready who knows?
 
Dimming incandescent lamps is easy and cheap. Fluorescents are different, the normal dimmers have very little or repeatable success with traditional ballast switches - elctronic controllers work better, but proper fluorescent dimmers are not cheap items and frequently require the use of special high frequncy tubes.

What some people do is have more than one time switch so that in the morning one tube lights, 10 minutes later another and so on, in the evening, they switch off with a delay between so the effect is lessened.
 
Since i don't have an actual aquarium light(a desk lamp actually, but it's been working for a year now) i find i can slowly darken the lighting by moving it farther away from the tank. I'll leave at that for a like 15mins, then turn the light off with my room light still shining on them. Another 15 mins later the light goes off and its dark. I try to slowing adjust the light in the morning too(like opening my door to let the sun some in). I probably take too many steps but hey I paranoid :fun: ....

I also see my neons dart back and forth at each other. I kind of think its funny though. Its weird though cus i have a neon thats full size and 3 others that are not so big. You would think the biggy would be the leader but actually he's the victim! Silly little fish
 
For the past seven days, I have been experiencing something similar with my bleeding heart tetras. Several of them appear to have seriously chaffed lips and they are hiding all around the tank. They and my redhooks have been acting quite asinine toward other members of their own kind. The redhooks are acting jerky to each other, but this isn't such a big deal ... they never do any damage. Some days it's like they absolutely hate each other, but at the same time have to be right up each other's butts, afraid they might miss out on something good.:D The BH tetras when not fueding are scattered in small groups of 2 or 3, whereas in the smaller tank they were always together, completely inseperable. (quick background info: 3-4 weeks ago, I moved all these fish(together) into this much larger tank. The only outsiders are the five angels).

After reading Daria Maxx's post in the chit chat forum, I thought maybe it was because of the fact that in this newer, larger tank I'd painted the back and one side ... and as she suggested this was stressing the fish. But the replies in that thread all seem to indicate this wouldn't bother the fish.

So I'm left wondering if this isn't some natural behavior that I'm not used to, since these BH tetras are my first experience with small shoaling fish. Ahhh, the joys of fish keeping. ;)
 
Royboy i think its time we had a talk about the birds and the bees and the flowers and the trees.the neons are not fighting.what looks violent is an aggressive male and a reluctant female.often females will drop eggs into plants below if you watch closely the eggs are usually consumed by passing fish.they sell beeding nets for that reason so when eggs drop they can fall out of reach.the males will prod at the female egg sack.ive even been guilty of that :lol: :lol: :hey:
 
>>> hey, if i only have a room light and a lamp and i turn both of them on suddenly, will it mess up the neon tetras eyes?

Well it will certainly give them a shock - they don't have eyelids and are naturally shady area dwellers.

>>> the neons are not fighting

Under very good water conditions Neons may scatter eggs, but unless very particular water conditions are met, i.ie water conditions not suitable for a community tank, they will not hatch anyway.
 
iv got an idea!!

how bout u put some sort of cloth or clothes or suthing on top of the tank before turning the lights oof, but not some opaque, so some light still enters and then anfter abt 5mins or so turn the lighrs off

correct me if im wrong
 
Thanks for all the suggestions guy's. But Fan o Fish was spot on the neons are getting used to the light now, it don't seem to worry them as much now, as it did at first.
But the aggression is still going on, I have six neons five are always out in the open but number six only comes out at feeding times, the rest of the time it is hiding among the plants.....Pet Shop Johnny is probably right and its a female unwilling to let them <Mod Edit - un-necessary>
 

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