YoYo loach problem

tosky

Can anybody help please I bought 3 yo yos to control snails 2 went in one tank who promptly ate all the fins off my siamese fighter the bigger one went in my window sill tank that has a single siamese in and dozens of pesky snails......! the yoyo has not touched a single snail and follows the fighter around rubbing and dancing around him he touches him constantly as if kissing him all over his body and fins but has no damage to the fighter they have been together 9 weeks now ..
doesn't seem to mind 95per cent of the time he does puff up sometimes and the yoyo then swims off. I'm worried he will turn on him as he's getting quiet big now is this normal behaviour and why so different from the experience with the other two ?

willow

your yoyo is trying to bond with the fighter,
he should go back as they do best in a group,they may still try and bond
with other fish,that's what i came across when i looked around on the
web,when my ones did the same.

thekoimaiden

I agree. The loaches NEED to go back together. A few things can happen when they are not in a proper group and none of them good. They can become fin-nippers and go after common targets like the betta. They can become withdrawn and refuse to eat anything. Loaches are highly social fish and need to be with loaches of the same species. Yoyo loaches also grow to around 5 inches and need a 4 foot tank as a minimum. If you cannot provide this you should return them.

As for the snail problem: loaches are not the remedy to this. Snails happen when there is more food than the fishes can eat or when there are a lot of dead plant leaves around. Reduce the amount of feeding and make sure you do some good gravel vacs; these will keep the snail population under control. Adding more fish which adds to the waste in the aquarium will only make the problem worse.

tosky

When I bought them from f s they kept 1 loach per tank in with each type of fish species and told me this was how they should be kept to a avoid aggression I thought this was why they had ganged up on the fighter as I'd put them together.... They can all go together in my main tank ,but at the moment are far to small for in there they are only 2ish cm long though quiet chunky and I never buy any fish I can accommodate when it is full size they move along until they reach the big boys downstairs.
I have removed the chewed on fighter so will put them all in there and go back to snail picking every evening

willow

hi
have you tried a lettuce leaf clipped onto the tank,then as the snails
chew on the leaf you can just remove the leaf with the snails attached,
cut back on feeding,because you are providing them with lunch.

Byron

Here again we have a store that gives bad advice. Sadly this happens.

Others have already mentioned the problems, and you can read about this species in our profiles, click the shaded name Botia almorhae or Yoyo Loach. It sets out the need for a group, the minimum sized tank, and that it should not be combined with sedate fish.

One can never take what one may see in a fish store as workable at home. Fish in store tanks are almost always living [or just existing sometimes] under very different conditions and usually these are less than adequate for the species. This is not necessarily the store's fault, but the point is that fish behaviour can be affected by their environment in many ways, and what "works" or appears to work in the store may not be anywhere near what the fish needs.

Last, but not least, welcome to Tropical Fish Keeping forum.

Byron.