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Round indoor pond project queries.

Smells Fishy said:
In the last second of the video that's when you can see the true size of your big clown loach
Click to expand...

There's two of them almost the same size so one might not necessarily distinguish them. I do confuse them myself but one is gravid at the moment, the other isn't. The one in the last second is the smaller of the two actually, the non gravid female.
 
Edvet said:
http://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/chromobotia-macracanthus/
Click to expand...

Quote from the link:
Supposedly exceeds 400 mm but reports from its native rivers suggest an average adult size between 200 – 305 mm, borne out by the largest aquarium specimens we know of.

The word SUPPOSEDLY is the catch.😉. No record. Only myths and legends. The biggest recorded loaches in aquariums were all less than 12 inches. Two were Marge, Albert, both between 10-15 years old, both around the 11 inch mark when they died. And there's now a fellow with five 24 years loaches, biggest 11.5 inches, smallest 24 year old is only 6 inches. There are many more records, none over 12 inches....yet....I hope mine outgrow that 🙂

There's another couple of records/videos/pictures I came across where the owners claimed fish 23 years and 30 years. One of the owners said the 23 year old is 8 inches. The other 30+ supposedly loach I've seen on a video, about the size of my big ones.
 
What kinda hurst me a bit with a HUGE why?????. And i can't help it.. But catching these fish in the wild? OK, juveniles no issues.. But at that size and that age.. Hence they get startled and hurt them selfs. Sorry, it might spoil the fun for a lot.. But darn!! Please learn from this! Be patient and grow them captive this size if you realy love them.. IMHO this aint love, this is selfishness.. selfFISHness!!!...... 🙄 😡:shy: And than smile and be proud?... cmon dude.. Use your grey mass!!
 
Someone on LOL (archives now maybe) had a video of his clowns spawning - as I recall he claimed at least one of 14in
(it's been years since I saw the video, but they were the biggest clowns I'd seen at the time)

BUT hobbyists tend to measure TL & scientists (generally) report SL so that could easily account for discrepancy
 
Yes, Marcel, I agree. Same thoughts crossed my mind. Clown loaches have very routine sort of behaviour that they stick to and such drastic change of environment must be a shock to the poor critters. Personally, I love small clown loaches but I did purchase 3 bigger ones last year, which of course were home raised, someone's abandoned pets. It was to wipe the memories of the clown loach that jumped out of my tank

alto said:
BUT hobbyists tend to measure TL & scientists (generally) report SL so that could easily account for discrepancy
Click to expand...

No, total length, nose to end of tail, 12 inches max is the current record. If you can find that video, it would be the only one ever to have had a 14 inch loach and loaches that bred. All other records are rather loaches expelling eggs rather than actually breeding. As mine is gravid too, I wonder what she'll do..

And a more scientific answer to the 12 inch max size...

Quote: In 2006, the biggest fish observed among 2300 specimens
caught in the Musi River (Sumatra) was 305 mm in total
length for a body weight of 469 g


http://hal.ird.fr/ird-01225687/document

...
 
Sounds a bit dense, ha, ha. I've noticed that trend of very large aquarium owners stuffing unlimited amount of fish, or dwarfing the tanks with tank busters that aren't suitable for any aquaria.

Then again...I have 13 clown loaches, 34 rasboras, 6 kuhli loaches, 10 corys, 9 denison barbs, 5 SAEs, a pleco.....hmm, did I miss anyone?....in a 240G. So its very easy to overstock without realising it...though I do not think my stocking is a problem yet.
 
I managed to get some pictures of the large female clown loaches during feeding this morning. They weren't co-operating with the camera flash though 😉

The first one is the slightly larger, gravid female. See the adult cory on the top right for size reference.... I've had this loach for around 5 years, bought her as a 5 inch loach.
Screenshot_20180211-080000.png


And the slighly smaller non-gravid other female below though its hard to tell on pictures. She's 6 years old, grown in my tanks from a baby.
Screenshot_20180211-080353.png
 
Blurry picture but you can see cory/loach size comparison to the gravid female. If an adult cory is about 5cm, then the loach is at least 5x5cm=25cm,nearly 10 inches, could be over that as the picture is not full stretch and the adult cory might be bigger than 5cm.

Screenshot_20180211-082524.png


And another blurry picture of the non-gravid female. Mind you that majority of these other loaches aren't small at all and a few years back I'd have considered them quite big....
Screenshot_20180211-080331.png
 
Smells Fishy said:
If you haven't already seen this then watch it. You've probably dreamed of all your clown loaches reaching this size, just a little insight for what your in for.

Click to expand...


Also, the loaches on the above video may look bigger first because they're elongated, where mine are also rather wide, and second his other fish are rather small tiger barbs, where some of my other fish such as denison barbs and loaches are in the 5-7 inch range, plus I can't get a close shot in the pond.

I am not fighting for sizes. I don't care what size my loaches are, just saying that one can exaggerate or under-estimate fish sizes based on the surroundings and the way the picture/video is taken.
 
I added a couple of clay pots on Saturday I got from the garden centre. One if them is sort of mid way between the clown's pvc pipe and their hollow cave, near the side of the tank where my chair is. Normally when the lights turn off the clowns would hang around the single hollow cave. This is now out of fashion and all had gathered around the small clay pot, ha ha. They didn't necessarily stay inside the pot but surrounded it, were nudging, kissing, trying to bite it, all sort of making love to cave behaviour :lol: It is definitely a hit 😀
 
I sat near the tank for a bit before Valentine's dinner....

Things I noticed....
When I open the door and look at the tank, little harlequins rushing towards the spot I feed. When I put my hand above the tank, little harlequin rasboras rushing again. They're very clever, figured out who feeds, where, when...very fast. They are obviously also a lot more confident now being in a large group. So far, although I can't ever count them again, I don't think I've lost any. They appear healthy and happy. They're still mad about doing circles around the perimeter...

Today I also saw a lot more colour on them, very iridescent orange/purplish stuff coming through which is good but still not as colourful as the old 6 that lived in there since last year.

I work nearby my local fish shop. I often go for a walk at lunch time. They had a new delivery. Nothing interesting really, they always have the same stuff but they have 4 black kuhli loaches in stock. I am itching to get them...for the small tub for a start but with the potential to add them to the pond with the other kuhlis. I am telling myself 4 kuhlis won't make a difference to the stocking levels 😛
 
sciencefiction said:
Quote from the link:
Supposedly exceeds 400 mm but reports from its native rivers suggest an average adult size between 200 – 305 mm, borne out by the largest aquarium specimens we know of.

The word SUPPOSEDLY is the catch.😉. No record. Only myths and legends. The biggest recorded loaches in aquariums were all less than 12 inches. Two were Marge, Albert, both between 10-15 years old, both around the 11 inch mark when they died. And there's now a fellow with five 24 years loaches, biggest 11.5 inches, smallest 24 year old is only 6 inches. There are many more records, none over 12 inches....yet....I hope mine outgrow that 🙂

There's another couple of records/videos/pictures I came across where the owners claimed fish 23 years and 30 years. One of the owners said the 23 year old is 8 inches. The other 30+ supposedly loach I've seen on a video, about the size of my big ones.
Click to expand...

I have 6, were 11 but they have slowly died off due to age, 25 ish year old clowns and the size difference I've seen with them is huge. They have all been raised together, lived in the same water, fed the same and the largest grown to nearly twice that of the smallest. I thought it might be a hierarchal thing with the dominant getting most of the food but began feeding at different ends, when the biggest ones were resting from sparring and it seemed to make no difference.
My biggest topped out at 11" TL one it died (meant I could accurately measure it) and the smallest is around 6" still. I had a baby 2" one given to me a few years back and it rapidly surpassed the smallest. For me the group seemed to be like the noah's ark, going two by two, as there were always two fish the same size at each size, so two at 6", two at 8", two at 10" etc.
How can you tell they are gravid and not fat? A few of mine looked the same as in your picture, ie large girth, but this was a constant and with eggs i'd have thought they would have gone through size changes. I changed the died and included more bloodworms and greens and they became more streamlined again, so put it down to a too high protein diet or not enough vegetable matter.
 
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