Loaches Online Forum

There was i, just minding my own business looking amongst the 'typical' same old fishes in the lfs. Then i spotted these little 'skinny' gem's. 12 of them came in as 'Red lizard Loaches' but two had died. Needless to say, i walked away with the remaining 10. Not a bad price either! 10 for £30. Emma, what are your small feeds please. I might have to actually worm these little chaps also.

Homaloptera orthogoniata we thinks?

thats a good find

Graeme do you constantly have spare tanks just waiting for new fish? your new room could well be overflowing soon

i hope you fatten them up well

Nice find Graeme

Thanks.

No spare tanks at the moment, i've just slipped these chaps in a established river tank until i fatten them up for the move.

don't you quarantine them?

I only quarantine fish from unknown lfs. I know the owner in this case and he Q's them. Pity his feedings are to be desired.

Homaloptera confuzona or Homaloptera orthogoniata? I cant tell the difference in these chaps.

Oh, Graeme...I am envious.
Well, at least I have Sewellia.
I would say those might be confuzona because, from what I have read, true orthos are supposed to have distinct edges to the saddles not the irregular ones of your fish. Both species are very similar, though.

Cheers, Jim. I've just been looking at Emma's

Same type of feedings like other Homaloptera hunters then?

Graeme, I would try our 'small foods mix' which consists of (well defrosted) frozen daphnia, baby brineshrimp, and cyclops. Ours have been eating plenty of this and are definitely putting on weight. They do seem to cope fine with Levamisole treatments too, so you should be ok to go ahead and worm them. The trouble with taking home skinny delicate fish like these so early is that you run the risk of not being able to feed them as intensively as may be needed without causing problems in the aquarium. That's why I prefer to fatten up specimens like this with lots of feeds per day on a system that can take several large water changes each day before I will consider selling them.

Over the last few weeks I have seen numerous fish lists with both H. confuzona and H. orthogoniata on them, so either both are being exported at the moment, or the suppliers are guessing at IDs.

Good luck with them!

Emma

Martin had them longer than I, so he will have more insight.
The ones I had, including a big, old(5yr+) specimen given to me over a year ago, enjoyed bloodworms and brine shrimp. I think Martin's ate a more varied diet including flakes and pellets.
They really get excited when they smell food. They remind me of minature nurse sharks in looks and actions.
I can just imagine them in a tank with Sewellia and gastromyzon.

Yeah, i have a feeling that there will be some loss's. I took the chance with them as the lfs owner quarantined them for 2wks and basically fed them Brine/Bloods and catfish pellets. Better chance of survival in my tank than his. More smaller water changes will be in order.

Thankyous.

Glad somebody I know is having a good day!

I think these are probably H. confuzona Graeme. H. orthogoniata tends to have 3 clearly defined saddles and the front one is generally bigger than those in pictures I've seen of confuzona.

Awesome find at a great price too! Definitely need some serious feeding. They're not at all like H.smithi for instance. Those really deserve the name Lizard Loach for their highly defined stalking of food.

In my experience, certainly orthogoniata are more in the shark feeding-frenzy mode of eating. they have incredibly sensitive sense of smell and go crazy when they smell food. They'll knock other fish aside in a mad rush towards the food source.

Make sure they have plenty of current because particularly when first introduced to a new tank I've found they'll really hang out in the blast or sit vertically in a stream of bubbles from an airstone.

Martin.

Cheers, Martin. I've noticed they seem to like hanging around the plant situated next to the powerhead with plenty of current and they certainly seem active with constant foraging.

hey robo i just picked up 5 myself and have noticed that they dont feel happy with out a lot of flow and i mean alot of flow.

just put them into a 24x18x20 with a ehiem 2026 and a powerhead pumping out 2000Lph and they started to eat. Before this they would not eat at all and where getting skinny. now just got to feed them up. had them for 72hours now so im happy with progress and the tank only 3 hours old.

Cheers nuvolari. Mine are in a 40gal tank with a power-head for a 80gal tank. They are, lets say 'enjoying' them self's.