yoyo loach is sick or acting

distrbd · Post by **distrbd** » Sat Dec 02, 2006 10:03 am

Hi all.
3 days ago I bought 8 yoyo loaches for my 90gal ,most of them are doing fine except one which is not eating and keeps lying on its side looking dead .A couple of times I sadly went to pick it up thinking it was dead but all of a sudden it got right side up and went away so my question is is this behaviour normal for yoyos ? the other ones don't seem to do that,Is he really sick?
As you notice I am new to the world of loaches and trying to learn more.
Any help would be appreciated.
Regards.
Ken.

helen nightingale · Post by **helen nightingale** » Sat Dec 02, 2006 10:18 am

welcome to the world of loaches, Ken. i hope you will find keeping them very entertaining.

normally, id say its quite normal for a yoyo to sometimes play dead. one of mine seems to like lying upside down in a plastic log, just so as you can see he's upside down, but cant get a close look at him. they can stay incredibly still, and then move like lightning to the other side of the tank, after ages of lying there. it can be quite unnerving. ive not noticed my striata do it, but i have heard of clowns doing it.

the only thing i'd question with your fish is as you say it's new and not eating. could you provide some more info on your tank?

what are the levles of ammonia, nitratate and nitrite?
do you know the pH of the water?
how long has the tank been running before you put in the loaches?
what other fish are in the tank with them?
do you have lots of hiding places/caves/plants?
have you studied the fish very closely for any other signs of disease?
is he very skinny?
what food are you giving them?

it could be that the fish is behaving normally and just not eating as he hasnt settled in yet, or is at the bottom of the packing order, or it could be that he does have a health problem. sorry to ask so many questions of you.

it is good to see that you bought a group of yoyos. that is so much better than just buying 1.

distrbd · Post by **distrbd** » Sat Dec 02, 2006 11:00 am

Hi Helen.
Thanks for your quick reply.
I am glad you say this behaviour is normal,even though he might still be sick,but he looks no different from the other ones,not skinny at all.I wish I could attach a few pics here but I don't know how.
The water parameters are good.the tank is a few months old, the water in it was from another 15 year old established tank,his tank mates are 40 small tetras ,one angel,4 clown loaches.the tank has a Lot of hiding places.
I don't know what to feed these loaches maybe you could help me with that ,but for now shrimp pellets,and algae discs.bloodworms,tubifex cubes.
I am plannig to add 3 more clown loches in the near future.
Thank you for your help.
Ken.

helen nightingale · Post by **helen nightingale** » Sat Dec 02, 2006 11:17 am

Ken that sounds good.

have you got acsess to hikari sinking carnivore pellets? loaches can find these addictive, so if you can get some it could be worth a try. maybe he has been munching on the other foods when you havent been looking? i hope that he is fine.

i use photobucket for my pictures. you have to log in, then you can easily upload photos from your documents/your pictures or wherever, and you have a photo album for them in photobucket. when you want to put a photo on here, click on the button at the top of the box that says Img, under the subject box, then copy the link to your photo, then click on the Img button again. that should work, but as im not bery good at taking photos, i dont do it very often. it would be interesting to see yours. im sure most fishkeepers are nosy and like to see other people's tanks or fish

distrbd · Post by **distrbd** » Sat Dec 02, 2006 11:42 am

thanks helen ,I got it.here arethe pics.: the yoyo acting dead,and the tank itself.[/img]

helen nightingale · Post by **helen nightingale** » Sat Dec 02, 2006 11:48 am

that is a beautiful tank! Wow

i se what you mean when you said there is lots of hiding places. it must be impossible to do a head count.

that yoyo does look very dead, doesnt it? they are so unnnerving.

mikev · Post by **mikev** » Sat Dec 02, 2006 12:01 pm

Hi, Ken,

Yoyo's, especially young ones, wll eat pretty much everything: from bloodworms, which are highly desired, down to algae wafers.

A loach that would turn down both frozen bloodworms AND frozen shrimp is probably unwell.

It may be that the loach is just getting accustomed to the new place -- this is a common problem -- but in your case it is probably not the case, since (1) it is not trying to hide either (2) there are other yoyo's around -- this tends to speed up acclimation and (3) while you did not mention its size, it is like a very young one, 1"-1.5" ? -- these tend to acclimate very quickly.

Still, since you have no obvious symptoms, you really have no option but to wait and see. Try to give it bloodworms

Deworming is ALWAYS a very good idea even if there are no "skinny" symptoms, internal parasites are a major health problem and symptoms are not always shown.

The other good idea is to quarantine, you never know what kind of disease may come with new fish, and you don't want to put the entire large tank at risk.

In your place, I'd have run a levamisole treatment, since it is needed anyway, and -- If I had a q-tank -- I'd have moved the loach to the q-tank. One reason is that in the q-tank I could leave a few worms for the loach to take, if it decides too; in your main tank, other fish will eat them before your weak one has a chance. Additionally, if nothing seems to work, in the q-tank you can try an antibiotic treatment, sometimes it does help.

Good luck.

mikev · Post by **mikev** » Sat Dec 02, 2006 1:36 pm

Append. (When I wrote the above I did not see the picture.)

This does not look good.

It is hard to know what caused the condition: could be parasites, could be bacterial infection, could be physical damage.

If you want to try to safe the fish, move it to a Q-tank asap, and hit it with a dewormer and a couple of antibiotics---maybe it will work. Even if you don't have a cycled Q-tank, you can try to treat in a bucket (1 hour antibiotic baths), or an uncycled small tank (use ammochips to suppress ammonia).

Or give it back to the store (which will doom it).

distrbd · Post by **distrbd** » Sat Dec 02, 2006 2:18 pm

Thank you both for your replies.
You wouldn't believe it but a small clown loach just went to snoop around the the yoyo thinking he was dead ,and all of a sudden it just jumped up and very quickly swam away!this fish does not look sick at this time but I think I will follow all your advice one by one ,first I'll wait and see, by tomorrow I'll know for sure if I should take him to a Q. tank.
Thank you all for comments,recommendations and compliments on my tank.I'll keep in touch and bug you all more with my questions.

palaeodave · Post by **palaeodave** » Sat Dec 02, 2006 3:44 pm

WOW, that is a beautiful tank! Are all those plants real?

distrbd · Post by **distrbd** » Sat Dec 02, 2006 6:07 pm

Thank you ,yes they are real plants,wow lots of compliments on this tank ,I really appreciate all your comments

TammyLiz · Post by **TammyLiz** » Sat Dec 02, 2006 10:36 pm

I love your tank, its beautiful!

I doubt it will be much help but I thought I'd share that one of my yoyos did the same thing to me last week. He layed on his side along the back glass and my heart sank down to my knees! I thought for sure he had died suddenly with no signs of illness. He did it three times that day, but hasn't done it since. He is eating and acting normally. I think he might have just been napping in a strange spot!

When I got my yoyos they didn't take to food very well either. It may be that he just needs some time.

Even though there is a possibility that this napping/eating issue may not be anything to worry about, a parasite treatment is probably still a good idea. I didn't do it and now I'm thinking one of mine (not the same one I mentioned above) must have a parasite. I should have just treated them when I got them.

distrbd · Post by **distrbd** » Sun Dec 03, 2006 10:19 am

Well I have never seen anything like this before,now they all do this lying on the side thing,these fish are the true clowns !!I really don't see anything wrong with them except they just tend to lay on their sides,they all eat well now and swim around fast.maybe like TAMMYLIZ says this behaviour may stop next week,but for now at least I am not worried.

Hey TAMMYLIZ thanks and good luck.I sincerely hope everything goes as smoothly as it can .

TheXman · Post by **TheXman** » Tue Dec 05, 2006 5:07 am

It's been very well documented that healthy clown loaches will lie on their sides on the bottom of the tank, playing dead. I think that I read somewhere online that yoyos do it too, but then again, you can find lots of bad information online. However, since clowns do it and now all of your yoyos are doing it and all are eating fine and looking healthy, I don't think you have anything to worry about. Hopefully someone who knows more about yoyos will weigh in soon on this one and give you a more definitive answer.

distrbd · Post by **distrbd** » Tue Dec 05, 2006 5:56 am

TheXman wrote:It's been very well documented that healthy clown loaches will lie on their sides on the bottom of the tank, playing dead. I think that I read somewhere online that yoyos do it too, but then again, you can find lots of bad information online. However, since clowns do it and now all of your yoyos are doing it and all are eating fine and looking healthy, I don't think you have anything to worry about. Hopefully someone who knows more about yoyos will weigh in soon on this one and give you a more definitive answer.

Thank you The X man.
Some members in another forum are sure (as you mentioned) ,this behaviour is quite normal with Yoyos as well clowns.

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