Loaches Online Forum

I was cleaning the gravel in one of my tanks and suddenly a small Gastromyzon ctenocephalus came flying out from behind the gravel cleaner. The fish started acting very strange and swimming erratically. I must have not seen it and accidently crushed it behind the gravel cleaner. It is now very pale and breathing hard and will probably be dead within the hour.
Even though I usually look before I vacume, I must have missed this little guy. I feel terrible....

Aw Jim, that's an awful feeling. Sorry...

Oh major bummer mate. Probably one reason I hardly ever gravel clean.

Martin.

Bad luck Jim. But where there's one........

Emma

Well, Emma, unfortunately, this was not a product of captive breeding. It was just a small gastro I picked up a few months ago.

Bad luck Jim!

Sorry Jim, I was getting mixed up there. I lost one of my two ageing Schistura balteata from the River Tank yesterday too.

Emma

That's too bad Emma. How old was your schistura?

Thanks Jim. I'm not 100% sure, but I must have had them for about 4 and a bit years and they were quite large when first imported, so probably weren't that young to start with.

Emma

That seems to be in line with my experience with large schistura species. I lost a large Schistura scaturgina last summer that was about six years old and a few months later lost a large Schistura kohchangensis that was about 4-5 years old. I have one more kohchangensis left that I got with the other one and its looking rather raged these days at about 5 years of age.