some strange stuff going on in my tank...

[Mark Janssen]

since yesterday my botia's are constantly chasing the barbs in the tank... there are about 18 barbs (odessa) en a lot of botia's... kub's, modesta
s, morleti, rostrata and almorhae.

the barbs are only being chased forcing them to go in a large school. There is no nipping what i can see towards the barbs but it could come to that i think (i sure hope not)...

but what is going on? the different botia's are not chasing between the species, well not more than usual...

there is only some show fighting when i change the or cut the plants or move and turn some rocks...

[mikev]

Interesting....

It may be that some loaches don't like Odessa's.

I had Odessa's originally with Clowns, within a month the clowns got so upset with Odessa's behavior that the Alpha clown killed the most obnoxious barb and clearly meant to kill the rest...had to move them to another tank. The trigger to the initial attack was that the Alpha barb chased the others into hiding/schooling with the clowns and then attacked the other barbs...clowns probably sensed this as an attack on themselves.

In the other tank they provoked at least the Kubs, at least two Barbs were found dead in the loach cave, where they apparently tried to hide overnight...with bite marks.

If this is a recurrent problem, this would be a real problem for me too...I have baby Odessa's I was hoping to put into the community loach tank, the clowns should have forgotten by now....

Exactly which Botia's are chasing the Barbs? I _think_ Yoyo's are safe (they never bothered Odessa's here, and TammyLiz keeps them w/o problems together)... I have no idea about most of the rest...

Your barbs, btw, look very nice....hopefully they would not get eaten...

[Mark Janssen]

Interesting....

It may be that some loaches don't like Odessa's.

My kub's never liked them by the way when they got to close they would chase them away

The trigger to the initial attack was that the Alpha barb chased the others into hiding/schooling with the clowns and then attacked the other barbs...clowns probably sensed this as an attack on themselves.

the biggest barb in my thank does the samething...

Exactly which Botia's are chasing the Barbs? I _think_ Yoyo's are safe (they never bothered Odessa's here, and TammyLiz keeps them w/o problems together)... I have no idea about most of the rest...

Kub's, rostrata and the almorhae do the most of chasing during the day... the morleti in will atack any barb trying to eat veggie's (the morleti defend a cucumber from other fish wile eating) the modesta are not much bigger than the barbs at the moment.

[Mark Janssen]

looking more closely (and longer) i'm sure that only the large males are prime targets of the kubs and the other botia species. females are only chased of for a few cm's but the males wil be chased around the tank... only the kubutai and the morleti seem te be nippy... when botherd

since the females try to stay in al large school in the upper waterlevels (male barbs chase them apart to for mating i think) but a soon as the can they will go back in a large school. the big males have there own spots in the tank.

it could be a bold statement but i read it more than less. about fights with barbs and dead barbs when kept with botia's.

so is it not a combination to avoid?

[mikev]

This is logical: the females are less arrogant and no so obnoxiously colored. The same happened here, males were more disliked.

I'm beginning to think that Odessa's are also somewhat nutty. I'm quarantining some juvs now. In one tank, it appears that there are 5 males and 1 female: the males totally ignore the female. In other tank, 1 male and 3 females: all three females are hiding behind the heater, the male does not allow them out... this is just not the way they should be behaving....

[geaston]

I have a 75 gallon tank in my office which startedoff for my 12 strong school of clown's my top water school was emperor tetras and cardinals as over time these died out due to age, I decided to add 6 green barbs at first no problems then after about a month, during feeding blood worms I watched all 6 barbs circle a lump of the semi frozen food one of the 3 inc h clowns came up through the group and dragged the lump down to the bottom well the clowns moved with it my alpha clown about 5 inch's jumped into the fray, next minute I have a green barb minus a eye and then 3 or 4 of the other clown started to herd the barbs all said and done I lost 2 green barbs. Since then I have put various Rainbows in with my guys no trouble at all. Just thought I would share this with you.

[mikev]

Something I remembered about Skunks and Odessa's:

A couple of years ago a bunch of Odessa's at a lfs refused to color. I got a few of them myself and they colored quickly, but those at the store did not. I was curious about this, so I asked the store to try a few things, like giving them bloodworms and putting some plants in...nothing worked. I gave up, but the store decided to try a stronger therapy: put in a few tankmates...skunks.

Well, Odessa's still did not color, but when I looked at the tank next, nearly every fin on every barb was damaged... It looked pretty gross... (but the skunks did not kill anyone...)

Anyway, given the cardinal murder story mentioned on another thread, it would be reasonable to assume that some small bright fish that hangs around in wrong places may get whacked by loaches....

[Emma Turner]

A couple of years ago a bunch of Odessa's at a lfs refused to color. I got a few of them myself and they colored quickly, but those at the store did not. I was curious about this, so I asked the store to try a few things, like giving them bloodworms and putting some plants in...nothing worked. I gave up, but the store decided to try a stronger therapy: put in a few tankmates...skunks.

Well, Odessa's still did not color, but when I looked at the tank next, nearly every fin on every barb was damaged... It looked pretty gross... (but the skunks did not kill anyone...)

Anyway, given the cardinal murder story mentioned on another thread, it would be reasonable to assume that some small bright fish that hangs around in wrong places may get whacked by loaches....

No, I'm afraid I don't necessarily agree with that. Compared to the average home aquarium, shop stock tanks are much smaller and generally (in the case of centrally filtered systems) more heavily stocked. Whereas I tend to stock 3 or more species of fish per tank in most of the stock tanks at work, I wouldn't dream of keeping anything with Skunk loaches in such a confined space other than Tiger Loaches and the like. Dither fish would be attacked and killed, there is simply not enough space for them to get out of harms way, which there should be in the home aquarium. Two totally different situations IMO.

Emma

[Tinman]

Skunks are the devil and must be subdued at all costs.No fin is safe. I no longer keep these cute little demons as mature ones are truly Tasmanian Devils in an aqaurium.
My name is Tinman and I'm a Loach-a-holic and I quit skunks ten years ago because they where destroying my life...........



Fish color directly relates to water parameters especially in groups so more o2 =more color. Also is more o2 = more energy so docile fish in a store will become more aggresive under better parameters. Clowns will eat the carcass but are not aggresive to kill. If there in no nipping there is no problem. Clowns at feeding doing damage is possible but Barbs (and I keep many) school with loaches singing and dancing and skipping through life given enough space . My Tigers are in specie tanks as my Blue Botia because of aggression. Yo-Yo's can be as mean as any other also but Clowns are not possesed nor do they kill. My Clowns and Kubs get along grand with my Robusta and an old crabby Yo-Yo. Balance is hard to attain but aggresive tendencys in a peaceful fish point to overcrowding or not enough feedings much of the time.I have had well over 1000 gallons for over 15 years and mixed and matched many types.Space is always the hardest problem to overcome.

[Mark Janssen]

my male odessa barbs are nicely red so color is not the problem the yoyo's and kub's just don't like them i guess. i put them on a dutch look a like of ebay (stores won't take back fish here that quick)...

the botia's don't fight amongst themselfs... i've got 4 spots in the tank where each group sleeps or hang out more than the rest of the tank. the morleti and the modesta are very keen on there sleeping cave and don't like to share. The kub's and yoyo's sleep where they like...

on the larger piece of driftwood at night it's often kub, yoyo, kub, yoyo, kub, rostrata, yoyo, kub in a long train like sleeping order. in plain sight.

[mikev]

...
Anyway, given the cardinal murder story mentioned on another thread, it would be reasonable to assume that some small bright fish that hangs around in wrong places may get whacked by loaches....

No, I'm afraid I don't necessarily agree with that.

Please notice my use of *may*...this is not something that happens all the time....

Fish color directly relates to water parameters especially in groups so more o2 =more color.

Now, this is very interesting. The store where they did not color is certainly O2-deficient: a single system and not very appropriate, no local O2 sources. Same Odessa's in individual tanks in say Petland usually are colored better, each tank has its own filter. I tend to overfilter even in qtanks, so these barbs tend to go to strong color....(and nasty behavior).

[Mark Janssen]

my barbs in the store where in a small tank with lots of odessa's... i think males only show color when they are certain that there is "room" for it. What would happen to a male that shows color with 50 other hidden males and 50 more females in a small tank. It would start WW3 between the males.

[mikev]

What would happen to a male that shows color with 50 other hidden males and 50 more females in a small tank. It would start WW3 between the males.

This is what is going on in one of my qtanks now. What was seen as 3m:3f at the store, turned out to be 5m:1f... the female is totally ignored, the guys are slugging it out.

[mikev]

It became obvious that one cannot use Odessa's with hillstreams as planned: they pick on Beaufortia's, and they behave even worse with Gastros, so these six just went into the loach tank.

The tank is pretty peaceful, there was only one fight seen in it in a year.

Barbs' appearance caused the following sequence of events:
1. One schistura tried to chase them, then another one. [These schisturas are peaceful]
2. One Zipper tried to chase them.
3. A Yoyo chased them for about half hour, chased them to a corner and then stopped.
4. Right now a clown is chasing them.

The good news are:
* No chasing from the kuhlis (yet).
* The Clown that chasing them now (pretty intensely) is not the one that killed an Odessa before.
* Loaches are having good time.
* It is only one loach at a time....for now.

It looks like loaches do hate Odessa's....I'd not be too surprised to see bodies tomorrow, it is the loach time in the dark.... Any bets?

Anyway, this is beginning to look like the barbs may have to go back to the store. I did not return fish for a long time, but this may be the only choice.

Seriously, this is upsetting. Odessa's are beautiful, but I cannot afford a Barb-only tank.

[Mark in Vancouver]

Pfffft.

Mike, it's very important that all sorts of fish keepers share their experiences on forums like this. As long as its kept within the realm of observation.

You have a tendency (that I find upsetting) to lay down the law based on your own observations. What's "obvious" to you may not actually dictate the experiences of other fish keepers.

The phenomena that you are recording so vigorously are those that take place in your own tanks and nothing else. Maybe your tap water is full of metal - or some other crisis - but please don't build a system of advice based on this.

I would be much happier if you would dispense advice that includes input from others. Instead you seem almost oppressed by the lack of quality observations put forth by the tens of thousands of other fish keepers around the world. Disappointed by the instructions on fish medications. Disappointed when you buy shoddy fish stocks from a dubious lfs (thus encouraging them) and the fish die.

I'm sorry. I don't want to butt heads over methodology, but please stop manufacturing advice based on your sole experience. If you're going to lecture someone over the taxonomy of loaches, please do some research before you wade in.

If offering advice is a compulsion for you, perhaps you can share with people how not to give advice.

Again, I'm sorry - I don't mean to trample your ego or inflate my own. I have simply been watching a lot of your posts recently and the more expert you sound the less expert you sound. Other people on this forum have agreed with me on this, off camera.

I am no expert, believe me. I would never laud my expertise above yours or any other fish keeper. But this last post broke my camel's back.

It's your tank - not fish in general.