Unsociable Loaches!

[fergalthefish]

I know clown loaches love each others company but i find that if i buy them together they're very sociable, following and playing with each other, but if i buy them separately, eg if one dies and i buy a top-up, then they dont bond, and just ignore each other. Anyone else find this?

 

[DerpPH]

Yes. On some occassions this does happen. When they dont arrive on thesame day

 

[TwoTankAmin]

In time they always work it out. When you add a new fish you are doing so into a group with an established pecking order and that disrups things for a while. Usually they work it all out among themselves after a while.

 

[rolo0151]

I had this with my zebra loaches. The 4 original ones all stuck together & the 2 I added later took to hiding. Within a few weeks they all started hanging out together though

 

[Tongue_Flicker]

A trick for introducing new ones would be to get the original one out first then put the new one in then release the original fish back. But should only be done in rare cases when the original fish gets too aggressive. Though like everyone said, it usually works out fine after a few days of acclimatization

 

[MBOU]

Loaches are very much sociable. If older loaches are ok but new ones die, I would say there is a slim chance of it being poor luck in personality clashed but more likely water quality problems or differences.
 
Fish that have been in the water a while build up a tolerance, fish newly introduced don't have that tolerance.. be it nitrates or nitrites or ammonia or a ph a point or two about what they were on at the shop of a GH or KH that is out of whack or a big temperature change of if tank wasn't kept dark and quiet when they were introduced...
 
So many reasons for new loaches to not work out..