Loaches Online Forum

Hi all,

I have been keeping for fish on and off now for about 20 years and have only just found these great little fish. I have 3 sewellia and 2 spiney heads sharing a tank with a grumpy old clown pleco and various freshwater shrimps.

My questions:

Do female Sewellia claim a terrority for themselves as the males do?

I have one fish that dominates all the others if they go near him. My smallest fish is at the bottom of the pack but I don't think it is because the fish could be female it is just a lot smaller what do you think?

Observations:

Gastromyzon change colour depending on their background which is really cool.

Best wishes,
Paul

hi Paul
yes. females try to dominate too. all sucker-species show the same behaviour: the biggest is the dominating one. in sewellia it's normally - adult specimen - a male, in pseudogastromyzon, gastromyzon, sinogastromyzon, beaufortia it's the female if both sexes are present in a group .
gastromyzon ideed can darken/brighten to a certain extent. in one LFS here the gastromyzon tank has black glasses at three sides and a huge black filter container. g ctenocephalus almost are black and brighten up at home.
cheer Charles

HI Charles,

Thank you very much for the info. Can you tell what sex my fish are by the following photos?

http://img687.imageshack.us/g/fossils1111013o.jpg/

Best wishes,

Paul

difficult to say: first is s lineolata male, female, male, pair, and so on. and the gastromyzon stellatus on the glass is a female. it's all I can see from far away.
cheers Charles

Wow thxs for the info, how can you tell? I am glad I have both sexes.

Kind regards,

Paul

hi Paul
just have a look at the species index or use the search function for the forum. a lot of good pictures to find.
for lineolata: I just have new youngsters in research for an explanation of the mistery of bad growth of this species in captivity.
cheers Charles

ch.koenig wrote: for lineolata: I just have new youngsters in research for an explanation of the mistery of bad growth of this species in captivity.
cheers Charles

Very interested in this.
Especially 'cause Sewellia sp."spotted" seems to grow at a decent rate compared to the very slow-growing lineolatas.

Please make a thread as soon as you have any data to ponder with!