clown loach trouble

I recently introduced 3 of my clowns to my 250 litre tank when they were in my smaller tank they were bright and colourfull active confident fish but now they are dull faded they hardly ever come out and when the do all they do is swim up and down the side of the tank with their noses to the glass they have been in there about 10 days now and I haven't seen the eat yet.these fish are my pride and joy I don't want them to die any ideas

 

What are your water levels, and what other tank mates do they have?

Austin

 

They could just be nervous in the new environment.

 

Do you have good hiding places for them? Putting some caves in there (home made or store bought) will help them feel more secure and more confident to come out more.

 

What are your ammonia, nitrites, nitrates, and other tankmates?

 

I checked my water and was horrified at the results ph was high nitrate and nitrite were both off the scale.This is a fairly new tank and I think I stocked it with fish to quickly without giving the filter a chance to mature ,anyway I have done a 30% water change and I have put some nitrate away in and will start another course of filter start in.the tank is 215l it has a shoal of rummy nose scissor tail and a few odd other tetras(they all swim together) 4 kissing gurami 3 rosie barbs 4 blue rams and my 3 clowns which were growing very quickly and afairly big common pleco oh and a blue shrimp that I haven't seen for a while,dead perhaps there was also 2 black knife fish but they both died on the same night

 

calum- first I believe your tank isn't cycled and possibly over loaded. Clown Loaches(aren't they wonderful ) are very sensitive to high ammonia, nitrites and nitrates. Is it possible to put them back in the other tank until this one is cycled?
Frequent water changes will be your fishes friend all the way through this, adding chemicals isn't always the best thing to do right away(sometimes it hides the problem).
Keep up the water changes and keep us posted as to how things go. By the way...
carol