Angry Clown Loach

[adrea]

We have 6 clown loaches and they have always semed to have gotten along however in the last week or two one on the loaches (the biggest) has become a holy terror.... He/she is not greying out but instead turning quite dark and begins relentlessly chasinging the other clowns. He is shreadding the tails of 2 other clown loaches closest to his size and I am not sure what to do, they do not really defend themselves they just try to escape and hide from him. He seems to let the other 3 be but when he starts chasing the 2 fish (one in particular) he can go for hours. I am starting to get worried they will not be able to cope with this much longer. I have tried rearranging the tank to make more hiding spaces and I just do not know what to do. I do not want to get rid of him but I m unsure what to do as the other 2 clowns are starting to get some really unacceptable levels of damage. HELP! What should I do?

[helen nightingale]

could you tell us a bit more about your tank please? it might seem irrelevant, but sometimes loaches can behave badly because they are uncomfortable in some way. by checking everything is OK in your tank, that can elimate a lot of possible causes.

how big is the tank?
how often do you do water changes? how much water do you change?
what are your nitrate, nitrite and ammonia readings?
what is the pH?
what is the temperature?
is there enough hiding places for the tank to look empty of loaches when they are at rest?
what is the size difference of the bad loach and the abused ones?
how long has the tank been set up?
how long have you had the loaches as a group?

sorry for such a long list of questions with no answers for you

[adrea]

Hi Helen,

The tank is 55 gal (we will be getting a bigger tank (220) in the next year or so when we get a new home

We do about 30 to 40 % water changes every 2 to 3 weeks

We have had an issues with Nirate in teh past bu we have put plants in and now all levels are quite low -don't register on standard test kit- (nitrate, nitrite and ammonia - we have never had issues with nitrite and ammonia) - PH also within acceptable limits but I forget the actual reading is but we looked that up a few times and confirmed

Temp is appx 75

Tonnes of hiding places I have a PVC pipe system running under the gravel that spans about 2.5 feet long and 3/4 foot deep with 3 tunnel entrances and 2 dead ends - except for tals sticking out of the ends of the pipes I would say they spend about 40 to 60 % of thier time hiding - for a long time we just had an empty looking tank except for a few tetra's
I have also recently introduced a little PVC pipe that is above the gravel for the abused ones to hide in but the do not even look at it// we have a fair smount of java fern plants that are quite big and a lot of driftwood and rocks positioned to make further hiding spaces

The largest loach is about 4 to 4.5 inches long (including the tail) - the other 2 being chased are VERY close in size - I would say the lesser of the 2 aboused is about the same lngth but not quite as filled out- maybe 1/4 inch shorter - the one tht is really getting it is about 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch smaller. The ones being left alone are about 2.5 to 3 inches long including tail...

The tank ha been set up for about 3 years and this grou of loaches have been together for about 1 year now (since the most recent addition that is is all grumpy now- apparently he used to be really grumpy in the fish store when we first took him but we have not had any issues until the last few weeks)

Perhaps it is a late dminance struggle - we had a really bad case of ich over christmas and we lost 5 other clown loaches some of which were simiar sizes - and we think a fish that was about 3 inches long but really plump who we think was the alpha loach - aft4er they died and the ich got better (mid January) - there was a week of in fighting (locking months and a bit of king of the castle games but nothing too violent) and we thought that the grumpy fish had then won dominance over the school.

Also about a week before this all started we took 5 serpae tetra's out and gave them back to the fish store because they were becomming tank bullys - sneaking up behind and fin nipping and it seemed to upset the laches quite a bit

No worries about the questions - I really really appreciate the help and support. Thaank you so much! I do not want to have to give him away; I think he is a really pretty and normally he is a fun fish to have around - he is quite bold normally and loves to zip around...

Do you think maybe we should get a few more smaller clowns to perhaps get a bigger school going? Perhaps they just need a few more friends!

Thanks again!

Adrea

[adrea]

Hi there,

The fighting seems to be slowing down (a bit) since I rearranged the tank. However the clowns that are being tormented seems to be getting fin rot where their tails were torn by the bully clown. I have tried to get pics but haven't been sucessful so far.

Kevin if you look at this post I tried the laser pointer to get some pics but all the clowns are scared of the laser pointer. LOL Figures they are major chickens, I think the PVC tunnel system under the gravel has encouraged them to be perhaps a little too recluse.

I am in Canada but I think we get a lot of similar meds as a lot of places. This is my first experience handeling fin rot. I was thining of putting in a 1/4 dosage of salt and some stress coat but I was wondering if there might be some better or more effective options.

Any suggestions?

Thanks again for the support everyone!

Adrea