Weird Behavior From Julii Catfish And Female Guppy

[sylros]

Hi all,
Since one of my female guppies is going to deliver any day, I happen to be watching the tank quite a bit. There's a couple of fish that are doing a similar thing and am wondering if it's normal and what it means. I've got a julii cory and the female guppy who is expecting anytime, rubing on the bottom substrate with is sand. Although they don't do this for very long, they do it 2-3 times, either as it to dislodge something, or as if there's an itch. Not sure if it's always the same side but they don't have marks and look healthy to me. Have you seen this behavior before? There has been some new fish added recently, 3 otto who are doing a marvelous job in getting rid of the dark algae. A 15% water change was also made over the weekend to bring down the ammonia which was barely registering and the PH was normal at 7.4, water is clear too...oh and I added some Java moss for the soon to come baby guppies. Any ideas?

Thanks in advance!

 

[fidjet2]

What is your tank size?
What is your exact readings for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate.
To get ammonia down you need to do about 50% water changes- for future refference-
It sounds like ich to me, that is normaly caued my stress- normaly from bad water quality.
Try and spot any white dots on four fish, normaly looks like grains of salt.
If they don't have them then we might have to rethink this.

thanks

 

[Tizer]

Fish do rub and scratch themselves using the substrate, a rock or wood from time to time and you dont really have to worry about it unless its really excessive. As mentioned this can be a tell tale sign of ich so do keep your eyes open for white spots.

If you have any ammonia in the tank then you need to focus on that before anything else, it should read zero. As mentioned a water change can dilute the amount of ammonia in the water and how much water you change depends on the reading you took. If you are having problems, you need to make every effort to keep it below 0.25ppm. It could be that the filter cant cope with the recently introduced fish or you are over stocked.

 

[sylros]

If this is normal, than how come the others don't do that except for the guppies. I've watched the male and the other female do that and it's done so jerkily, it just seems odd. I was aware to keep the ammonia below .25, not that it was at that point but it was getting there, hence the water change...but you might be right, I need to make bigger water change which I haven't done, just more frequently...does that replace it? It's just that I would need another bucket to be able to do a 50% water change...

My tank is 10gal, yes yes I knows it's very small...it's temporary! The fish in there are: 2 julii cory, 1 panda cory, 2 flower shrimp, 3 oto cats, 3 guppies, 4 zebra danios (2 are flying ones) and 1 white cloud. My next fish will be bright in colour! Oh yeah, and then I have 6 baby guppies in the breeding tank (born on Sept 27). There's lots of stuff left at the bottom of this tank even if I'm extremely careful in feeding them.

The oto and shrimp are recent because of the algae...not that I had a lot but I did have to clean the glass. Java moss has also been added but now it looks a bit funny, not sure if these are new shoots or the fact that the ammonia would do that to the plant. Entirely possible...never had a live plant in the tank but am an avid gardener.The tank light stays on during the day only, these are florescent...another possible issue is the wrong light but the Morimo ball seems to be doing just fine.

I think I need to do a serious water change. What r you're thoughts...am I over populated?

Oh I forgot to mention that there is no ick on the fish, on any fish...they look healthy. I've had ick before, and these definitely don't have it.