Wow my loaches are getting big and aggressive eaters, am I not feeding enough?

They are getting big enough now that they are putting the whole shrimp pellets in their mouths. They are omega one- fairly big pellets. Am I not feeding them enough?

They are about 4-6 inches clown loaches.

 

small tank, they will outgrow. overcrowded

 

Yea. They will get a new home eventually. Right now, they have so many hiding spots and all attempts to catch them have failed. So, when they leave it... I think I will have to pull everything up and out. They are in a 75 right now.

Honestly they won't use all of the tank bc usually they are too afraid to come out. I guess they are still babies. But they are very healthy. When they sprint they can do it, but otherwise they prefer to cuddle and hide until feedings.

EDIT: well they do come out and in the background they do look around the gravel all the time. I guess looking for snails or something. Like right now I see 4 doing it, where I can see. But honestly, they do not use it all (which is partly because they stay at the bottom)- they did not always stay at the bottom. When I got more of them, they use to be out more. But, may be they were establishing order. I never see any of them alone (unless it was very sick).

They have bright light, but the plants really do a great job of covering it up.

 

They will do better if you feed them a quality cichlid pellet over shrimp pellets. They will also eat anything meaty like chopped fish or shrimp. Have you tried to measure them for an accurate measurement? They look to be more like 2'-3" than 4" and definitely not 6". When they close to 6" their body shape starts to change a bit and they get a lot rounder in the mid-section. Also takes a few years to reach that size.

 

only my alpha is 6 inches. But many of them were wasting when I got them. These are the ones that I nursed back to health... The rest died

So their bodies can't be expected to be normal- necessarily... Those circular things are the "large" ones. That molly there is an adult and he is 4 inches and fat.

That zebra is an adult and pregnant.

Who makes the chiclid pellets?

 

I feed mine Omega one most of the time with some NLS, HikarI and Ken's occasionally. Can you post a pic of your alpha?

 

Sure! As soon as I can get it, will do! They have a tremendous amount of hiding places and they dart as soon as I get near it, but they come out during feeding- so I can do that next time! But yeah they do grow much, much more slowly than other fish. They are spoiled. They get blood worms about* 2x a week and have denitrate towers so they don't have to deal with any nitrate. They also have so many hiding spots that they don't use them all. I have one who tries to fight the alpha for his position a lot, and he is in the second photo on the right, toward the top. But here he was not greyed out. They are all very black in the photo. I also have cherry shrimp in the tank that they munch on a lot.

They also had ICH. They underwent treatment of metro for 2 weeks and flubendzole for 2 months. They had worms and stuff escaping their bodies, some had internal bleeding when this happened and died. They also had gill flukes. They went through a lot but the ones that survived are healthy now. Only 1 is a bit skinny, but today I saw his belly fat with food, so it is a good sign.

Like I visually saw worms leaving one of them, it was disgusting, but I saw the internal bleeding on others following the treatment. The worms were escaping and dying when escaped. The one where he had massive amounts of worms escaping with that treatment later died. But some with smaller infestations of worms leaving survived.

Also, to make it worse, they survived my error of excel overdose- I forgot to say- I lost my biggest fish here. So you may be right- my biggest is probably 5 inches. I lost a couple of loaches. I regret that mistake, because that is the only real one that I made. Everything else was constant care.

 

A 6" loach in a 3' tank is pretty noticeable. I mean my biggest is just over 7" and is quite noticeable in a 5' tank.

 

Yeah, you are right, I lost my old alpha. I forgot, I regret that... I made an excel overdose error. And my next biggest- is 5 inches probably. I lost 2 of my biggest and a bunch of smaller ones. However, once they shriveled in my trash can, they were smaller. It was sad. But look at their history and you will see how they are probably not going to be as "fat." that is their history

"They also had ICH. They underwent treatment of metro for 2 weeks and flubendzole for 2 months. They had worms and stuff escaping their bodies, some had internal bleeding when this happened and died. They also had gill Flukes. They went through a lot but the ones that survived are healthy now. Only 1 is a bit skinny, but today I saw his belly fat with food, so it is a good sign.

Like I visually saw worms leaving one of them, it was disgusting, but I saw the internal bleeding on others following the treatment. The worms were escaping and dying when escaped. The one where he had massive amounts of worms escaping with that treatment later died. But some with smaller infestations of worms leaving survived.

Also, to make it worse, they survived my error of excel overdose- I forgot to say- I lost my biggest fish here. So you may be right- my biggest is probably 5 inches. I lost a couple of loaches. I regret that mistake, because that is the only real one that I made. Everything else was constant care."

Of the ones I obtained only about 5-10% were a normal weight, the others were all below weight (many anorexic) due to parasites at very critical growth periods.

Here are some photos of them younger.

View attachment IMG_1320.jpgView attachment IMG_1489.jpg


the last one is with the light turned up. I think my huge plants dwarf them now. But here they are in open waters. more healthy. In most of the above ones you can see their back spines, even if you cannot see it in the photos. One I was able to capture a worm leaving, I missed the others- didn't think of it

View attachment IMG_1657.jpg

but I lost two of my biggest.


Edit also 3 months of prazipro. I had relentless flukes and tapeworms, so they are not as fat as your accomustomed to seeing. They were ill cared for