Luděk's Antics

This is a thread devoted to the antics of my Bolivian ram, Luděk.

He is willing to go to any length and pay any price to steal food from my particularly placid crayfish Simon.

Simon has never made any aggressive advances towards him and is slightly scared of him. He only tries to strike at Luděk to defend his food from his gluttonous fishface.

 

looking forward to hearing about all of his...antics

 

Lol I think Luděk is concerned about the welfare of the mossball as Simon has dragged it into the log and is assaulting it, and Luděk keeps poking his head in before pulling out and hovering over the log.

 

Mossball assault can get you 5-10 years jail time, sorry simon you're going to jail.

 

Mossball assault can get you 5-10 years jail time, sorry simon you're going to jail.

Lol Luděk must be on the Neighborhood Watch

 

If I knew how to put that thing over the e in ludek I was going to title this thread and invite you to it. I was getting impatient lol.

 

If I knew how to put that thing over the e in ludek I was going to title this thread and invite you to it. I was getting impatient lol.

Lol I was too tired to think of anything to put in the thread last night so I decided to wait until today lol

 

Lol Luděk is watching the Olympic swimmers; every time he sees them in their starting positions, he comes to the front of the tank and starts freaking out.

 

Lol sometimes, when Luděk sees several tetras close together he feels the need to dart into their midst just to see them scatter.

 

It's like screaming 'fire!!!'

 

Hi, sending greetings to Luděk from Slovakia

 

I find it funny how Luděk's colors change when he's messing with Simon; most of him turns white, but the stripes over his eyes, the spots on his sides, and the leading edge of his dorsal fin all turn super crazy dark.

 

I thought he was all white. What does he normally look like?

 

I thought he was all white. What does he normally look like?

He's usually a washed-out olive-yellowish color that can sort of be considered off-white. He just gets even whiter.

 

Hahaha, Luděk isn't the smartest fish in the world... He was chewing, ejecting, and chasing a pellet around and he sent it through the narrow space between a plastic plant and the back wall. He made several attempts to push through between the plant and wall, but couldn't make it. He then stared at it with his body language sort of showing perceived defeat and he stared at it through the plant for a moment, and then gave up and darted elsewhere. He never tried to go through the more flexible part of the plant or even to go around it, He just gave up.

 

What kind of fish is he

 

What kind of fish is he

A Bolivian ram

 

A Bolivian ram

Thanks for letting me know.

 

So, I recently added pond snails to my tank as an alternative food source for Simon in the hopes they would establish a breeding population. Earlier today just before I was leaving, I saw a snail on the glass on the front, and Luděk also saw it and came to investigate. He poked it with his nose, and then sucked the whole thing into his mouth, rolled it around a bit, and spat it back out onto the gravel. I didn't get to see if he successfully ate it or if it got away since I had to leave, but I'm back now and can't seem to find that snail anywhere. It was the fastest one of the 4 I got, so maybe it's hiding somewhere out of sight. Do rams usually eat snails? I think I've heard that somewhere before, but I'm not sure.

Update: I found the missing snail. I only know the whereabouts of 2 of 4 snails.

 

Luděk and Simon have been hanging out together in the log at the same time recently, it's super weird and it makes me nervous lol. What makes it weirder is that sometimes Luděk will swim out of there displaying his mating colors, but they disappear quickly.

 

This is all very interesting lol

 

I swear, Luděk hates water change day. Every time, he hides among the plastic forest and brings his stress stripes out all the way and just looks mad.

 

I've noticed the same thing on my festivum Kosmo.

 

I've noticed the same thing on my festivum Kosmo.

Interesting

What's funny is that sometimes if the water change gets interrupted, the tetras will stop being scared and will make a game out of creating wakes on the still surface of the water by ascending to the surface and darting as fast as they can just to stop and look at the way they disturbed the surface, while Luděk just sits at the bottom looking upset. He literally folds his pelvic fins up and sits on his belly until the water change is over.

 

Lol Luděk is so particular about the size of his food before he swallows it, and it's kind of a disadvantage to him. Like the other day, he was working at a shrimp pellet, and had whittled it down about halfway, and had it in his mouth, and spat it out in order to put it back in his mouth, as it was still too big for his sensibilities, but at that moment, a glolight tetra had drifted down in front of him, and, without skipping a beat, swallowed the ejected pellet whole, and shot off elsewhere to continue eating.

 

LOL.. I could imagine his reaction after the tetra took off with it.

 

LOL.. I could imagine his reaction after the tetra took off with it.

Lol he had this look about him that said (sarcastically) "Oh of course, why would I expect anything different!"

 

Luděk, you poor misguided fool, water changes are a good thing! Lighten up!

 

Haha, I think Simon has trained Luděk to avoid kelp tablets. Considering he's only ever gotten pinched while trying to steal them from under Simons watchful eyes. Like tonight, Simon decided to take a break from eating his tablet and discarded it before walking away. Luděk had been nearby and came through the plants and saw the kelp tablet on the gravel. I thought he might try to take a nibble from it as Simon was distracted trying to get into a very small hole. But instead, once he noticed it and confirmed what it was, he got super nervous and backed slowly away from it before darting elsewhere.

 

I got a nice shot of Luděk while he was hiding during the water change last night.

 

Lol any time I want to take a picture of him, he's got his dorsal fin folded flat, he brings out his stress colors for no reason and puts them away moments after I stop trying for a pic, he won't show his sides, or just won't hold still. I now understand why people say cichlids are camera shy.

 

Why must Luděk abandon his food if it gets stuck to the intake? He was literally swimming right next to it, doing his "moar fud!" dance...

 

Eating off an intake is obviously beneath a fish of his stature

 

Where's Simon? I'd think he would have been all over it or is he just not into leftovers?

 

Where's Simon? I'd think he would have been all over it or is he just not into leftovers?

I think Simon avoids the intake tube just because his antennae get pulled into it. Luděk, however, has no issues with it, he just refuses to eat off of it. When he gets food, the first thing he does half the time when he gets food is swim super close to the tube with it jutting out of his mouth just to tempt fate.

 

Ok, so, Luděk has gone ape on the bladder snails I got for Simon. They were all really small except for one big one, and Luděk has hunted them down with prejudice. I'm sure there are some left, but he plucked a bunch of them out of the gravel, and tried to eat the big one, but couldn't.

 

Whoops, I may have accidentally mashed the last remaining bladder snail that managed to evade Simon and Luděk, as it was on the lid of the tank, and I opened the lid to feed the fish, and while the lid was open, it moved to where the lid rests on the tank, and I heard a nasty crunch as I closed the lid.

 

I got a really good shot of Luděk last night. Simon's peeking around the plant like "Soon..."

 

Lol I love how Luděk gets super excited if he sees me pick up the bottle of shrimp pellets, he starts beating his fins faster, wiggles around, and swims higher. It reminds me of the "dance" my dog does just before being fed.