Loaches Online Forum

hi there,

i have some important questions about sewellia lineolata. first, 5 sewellia live in my river tank together with l-134, witch is a strange combination. but it works very well. sometimes the temperature rises up to 30 degrees celsius but the sewellia shows no signs of aversions - it seems that they really like hot water with a strong current.

i tried to stimulate the peckoltia l-134 to breed with soft and acidic water it works, but with a bigger effect on sewellia. they become very territorial, an they fight sometimes for hours at the front window. after this fights some sewellia shows injuries, like ragged fins and the loss of scales. until now, no sewellia is really bad hurt, but i fear they really could kill each other. did anybody of the readers know such behaviour? are the examples of sewellia acting like this?

the next thing is, and that is perhaps a small sensation - yesterday evening i watched my tank after the weekly water change. (untempered soft and acidic). feeding time, every fish is fine - the sewellia are hunting each other like every evening. but suddenly two of them began to lurch like hooked together. they had swum towards the surface - into the heaviest steam of the powerhead and suddenly - there was a big cloud of very small and clear eggs. i dont think threre are any egs left today, but i hope there is a small chance for the fry.

has anyone of the forum make such an observation? is sewellia lineolate just spraying there eggs in the water? what do you think about this?

after yersterday evening i am shure that sewellia will breed in my tank, perhaps you could help me with some important information. next week i will try to make some pictures, but the hole thing just takes a few seconds. let's see …

x

frankfurt / germany

Hi there and welcome to Loaches Online.

Firstly, do you know for sure that you have both male and female S. lineolata in the tank? See: http://forums.loaches.com/viewtopic.php?t=2690

Secondly, here is a thread I posted a while back which shows two males locked in an aggressive fight sequence: http://forums.loaches.com/viewtopic.php?p=1285
Is this anything like you are seeing?

Also, here is a link to my successful breeding of this species, although I have never witnessed the actual act of spawning itself: http://forums.loaches.com/viewtopic.php?t=1620

Emma

hi emma,

until yesterday i was shure that i have a least two males the sexing is not easy, but i took pictures of them. after seeing the eggs - i know between the 5 ist one girl

the fighting is like in the pictures, but even harder, and it takes up to an hour - thats very long. everything is very fast, but sometimes i see small spikes on the head. perhaps the is just an imagination.

i have read the thread of the spawning, there are some reports of "filtered" sewellia babys in germany too. but i didn't find detailed information about the water conditions.

ohh - good idea - the filter!

x

It is unusual that you think you've seen eggs/milt expelled when the fish were high up in the water column. Up until now we have kind of presumed that they might spawn in a similar way to Pseudogastromyzon species and dig pits in the substrate.

Emma

hi,

i have seen this "pits" sometimes in the morning, but i think this is more a sign of territorial behaviour. sometimes it looks like the males design places to wait for females.

i was very surprised about what i have seen, but i think the place is not so important, i think the strong current was the target for them. it is possible that this species just trough their eggs into the current and thats it. they don't care about the fry.

these are just some pics of the sewellia: