What Fish Do You Regret Buying?

[seannx]

My bristle nose pleco also is almost never seen, but also has stayed small so so far he hasn’t gone back to the store. I bought 6 halfbeaks thinking they needed to school, but they were all territorial, and died over 8 months. They would be fine, and then go suddenly. I suspect they may have injured their beaks on the tank glass. They were also the only fish I ever saw go after my cherry shrimp.

 

[WhistlingBadger]

My bristle nose pleco also is almost never seen, but also has stayed small so so far he hasn’t gone back to the store. I bought 6 halfbeaks thinking they needed to school, but they were all territorial, and died over 8 months. They would be fine, and then go suddenly. I suspect they may have injured their beaks on the tank glass. They were also the only fish I ever saw go after my cherry shrimp.

I've heard a lot of people say that about BNPs. I had one once and he was always out in the open. Guess I got lucky. I've always wanted to try halfbeaks but all the ones I've ever seen had injured, deformed beaks, so I've never gotten them.

 

[Stan510]

I regret adding non Boesemani Rainbow fish to my aquarium of M. boesemani. My advice is to just keep only them in as large an aquarium as possible.
I should add- the eye pleasing look is stronger with only them than when you add other types; Something you will agree with if you try to mix- and 99% of keepers will mix in other Rainbows. I tell you- my Bozys look like marine fish..deep colors and deeper Tang like body. Not the torpedo tuna look with youngsters.

 

[Tl52505]

my black skirt tetras, I had only 1 for a while and felt bad because they do better in schools and got a couple more, big mistake. They are so aggressive and rule the tank during feeding time

 

[Spideysmom]

Cherry Barb. I call the males little red devils. The girl at the store told me that they were non aggressive...lol. Little bastard might be beautiful but mean, he killed 3 of my other fish before I removed him

 

[Essjay]

Interesting. I have a shoal of 16 cherry barbs, including 5 males, in a tank with pearl gouramis which would be the obvious target for aggressive fish but I have never seen any damage caused by aggression.
How big was your cherry barb shoal? If there aren't enough of shoaling fish, that can cause them to be aggressive.

 

[Colin_T]

Cherry Barb. I call the males little red devils. The girl at the store told me that they were non aggressive...lol. Little bastard might be beautiful but mean, he killed 3 of my other fish before I removed him

How big is the tank?
What fish did the cherry barbs kill?
How many cherry barbs did/ do you have?

I have never had a problem with cherry barbs causing problems to anyone.

 

[Lemon]

Ok so I got this betta and he seemed fine happy eta eta. And then a week later he kicked the bucket. He was completely healthy. We believe it was poor genetics but come on. I payed 15 dollars on him plus all the money to set up his tank for him to just die like that. Very irritating when he was such a great fish.

 

[Colin_T]

Ok so I got this betta and he seemed fine happy eta eta. And then a week later he kicked the bucket. He was completely healthy. We believe it was poor genetics but come on. I payed 15 dollars on him plus all the money to set up his tank for him to just die like that. Very irritating when he was such a great fish.

Usually water quality or disease if they die within a week of you getting them.

If the tank was newly set up, then the most likely cause of death would be poor water quality (ammonia).

 

[Lemon]

As far as I know he had good water quality. I filtered the tank for two weeks for the nitrogen cycle and he had no ammonia when I put him in. Didn’t test the water while he was in there so it’s plausible

 

[Essjay]

Filtering the tank for 2 weeks does nothing to grow the good bacteria I'm afraid. That needs ammonia adding to the tank until the bacteria have grown before getting fish - a fishless cycle. There was no ammonia when you got the betta because there was nothing yet to make ammonia. But the betta would have been excreting ammonia from the moment he went in the tank and with no bacteria to remove it, ammonia would have built up in the water.

If you want to try again, either cycle the tank using ammonia first or add a lot of live plants and wait till they are actively growing. Plants use ammonia as fertiliser and with enough plants, they can remove all the ammonia made by the fish.

Cycling Your New Fresh Water Tank: Read This First!

Cycling Your First Fresh Water Tank What is Cycling and Why is it Important? Fish waste, and especially fish breathing, plus uneaten food and other organic matter breaking down in a tank all produce Ammonia. This can quickly become toxic to fish if it is allowed to build up to any measurable...

www.fishforums.net

 

[Synergy0021]

Had a leopard pleco. Started out small but grew to 2/3 the length of my 30 gallon tank. When he grew big he became very lazy and just sat there with long trails of poop. He kept trying to disable the filter. Died of dirty water/old age.

 

[Lgrhm215]

Dwarf gouramis and neon Tetras. Gourami’s are cool and all but I wish I had just gotten something a little different for my tank. I’ve had neon tetras fight to the death before. I’ve gone through 8 fighting to death. I still have 4.

 

[Back in the fold]

Something to always keep in mind if you're like me is that some fish don't ever seem to die. I can't bring myself to get rid of a fish for any reason. I don't have any fish friends anymore that I can fool into taking them and I don't have a big culler fish at present. So be careful who you bring home and pass on the Kissing Gouramis.

 

[Valkyrie_Lips]

As much as I love my betta I do regret impulse buying him. I didn't realize they lived so long with proper care. I thought he would be "gone" by the time I moved away for University. Fast forward 3 years later and I'm moving for uni this fall. I mostly regret buying him because of the huge hassle it is going to be moving with a tank and an older betta. I'm afraid that it'll be incredibly stressful for him. Not to mention possibly having to acclimate him if the water in that city is drastically different from the water here. *sigh*