Loaches Online Forum

Hau kolas..question for you..

A few days ago, I tore down a 45G with my second trio of clowns in
it..I got these guys about 6 months ago at about 1.5" each, saw them
for about a month, then they startehanging in a cave most of the day. I
work nights, so didn't see them then either. anyway, I moved this tank
to another room, and now they are much more active during daytime. So
I'm watching them today, and notice that one has developed light black
spots on it's flank above it's ventral fins. Almost perfectly circular,
approximately in the same location above each fin. I never noticed this
before. Not especially concerned with it, just curious to know if
anybody else has or has seen clowns with spots before? It definately
did not have these spots when I acquired it, but I've never seen a
clown change it's pattern before. Behavior & feeding is
normal, the clown in question is maybe 4" now, the other 2 closer to
3". TIA for any insight. It's been suggested that some clowns have spots instead of bands, but this one has the "normal" bands, just developed the spots above the fins in addition.


lila pilamaya

Hi lila,

How big are these spots? They could just be pigmentation marks and nothing to worry about. Some Clowns seem to develop these markings, just like some people have freckles.

Emma

Not that unusual actually. I saw some really nice Clowns in a shop yesterday and 4 out of the 6 had these spots. Symmetrical too, which is not always the case. Clowns can have many variations from the "standard" appearance....

http://www.loaches.com/markings.html

Martin.

thanks for the replies, ah the spots are appoximately 10mm across, hard to really get good measure..the clowns have really been hard to ctach holding still long enough to get a close look. Likewise trying to capture a picture. thanks for the insight and for the link to the article, quite informative. If I manage a picture, I'll post it.

thanks again
-lila pilamaya