My thoughs and experience with my first little dat

asm129

Gambusia
MFK Member
Dec 28, 2009
642
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Cafe Lu
About the stable/unstable problem you're having:

How many other fish are with him in the tank? If it's a single baby dat in with other fish, sometimes being alone makes them scared and unstable. I bought 1 NTT last year and kept him in my small community tank and he was always unstable. But now I have a dats only tank and they seem less scared and more stable and active. I think being around others of their kind helps them come out more.
 

Rawrs.

Candiru
MFK Member
Nov 4, 2009
178
2
48
New York City
I got my first few at around .5 inches? and within 1 months time they're around 2" - 2.5" so maybe a year till they hit the 6" mark or less. Definitely not 3-4 years.
 

Jakob

Piranha
MFK Member
Feb 22, 2008
4,408
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Iceland
The key to make a dat grow as fast as possible:
Feed a lot of frozen food:
Shrimps
Bloodworms
Mysis
and more.

Keep him in a tank about 20-55g (nothing smaller than a 20, even if he is 1")
And change about 30% twice a week or 50% once a week (your call).

Good luck with him.
 

bahamaqt00

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Oct 7, 2009
765
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kirkland wa
Thanks for the good advice everyone! He is currently the only one in the tank. He was the last dat in the LFS, I wish I could have gotten 3 or 4. We have a 55gal that doesn't have fish in it but something went majorly wrong and there is green alge EVERYWHERE. So I think we are going to drain it, wash it, start over and let it re-cycle and then add then let the dat have that all to himself. As for right now he is in a 10gal.
 

Ade

Piranha
MFK Member
Jun 7, 2008
3,534
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London
MsMassPoly;3988260; said:
in 4-5 years with good feeding and water changes he should be about 6 inches.
thats wierd, I have an IT i got in 2005 at 1 inch. It is now 11.5 - 12 inch (and he's not that greedy compared to other tigers in tank)

first 6 months in a 10g all on its own and a crappy fluval 1 internal (i wouldnt recommend this set up)

the rest of its life, it is in a 125g with decent filtration and feeding.

6 inch in 4-5 years is stunted growth for tigers, even for the slow growers like NTT and NGT.
 

Victor-Falko

Candiru
MFK Member
Oct 8, 2009
329
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Dutchess County, New York
bahamaqt00;3988224; said:
It's funny you say that. I mean a ton of people here say that and then I see others saying they grew an inch or two in like 4 months.
Indos grow at a good speed from .5in to 4in. After that, it slows down. When they hit 8-9in they really growth really slows down!
 

bahamaqt00

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Oct 7, 2009
765
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kirkland wa
I glad to hear that they at least get to 4-6" before their growth really slows down. I just need him to about 6" before he can go in the big tank
 

Fractal

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Mar 3, 2010
137
0
0
California
I've had my IT's for a little under a month and a half and they've already grown about 1/2". 4 out of 5 of them are a little less than 2", there is one smaller one but that's the one that everyone picks on.
 
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