pic of the Oscars be great, as for blood warms, best thing for your Oscars is a quality pellet, they are true omnivores and need there veggies, good pellet best thing to get them that, protein treats are great once or twice a week, but they need the balanced diet, hiding is not typical behavior for Oscars, might look to something making them stressed.
Yea Ive seen some pretty cool rainbows at my lfs so that could be an option too. I Can try and get a picture of them if they come out. I feed blood worms and this Omega One super cichlid pellets. They sometimes will eat a couple pellets when I drop them in but then they just look at me and wait for the blood worms. They only come to me if I am dropping in food and even then sometimes they are too shy to wait for me to drop it in. The Bichir and Reed fish ignore the blood worms and goes for the pellets. I also forgot to mention that my bigger Oscar is constantly chasing the slightly smaller one anytime they are out feeding or swimming.
I have never heard of healthy Oscars hiding like this. But every fish is different. The fact that both are hiding is telling me they are stressed out. Something is off, that's my best bet.
Start at the basics and definately do not add fish. Fish that are not quarantined are only going present you with more risk of diseases.
Basics:
Water quality - cycled? Low nitrates? No ammonia or nitrites!
Temps - appropriate temps are met and held reasonably stable?
Lighting - avoid super bright lighting or don't run lights and see if that helps.
Hiding spots and aggression - make sure you have caves and that no one is being bullied
Diet - variety is key, quality foods only, no crap fillers.
Diseases - check you fish for poor coloration, physical abnormalities, wierd poops, cloudy eyes, healthy weight ect.
If you can rule out all of the above then start looking at dither fish, but quarantine first for min 2 months to be safe.
Start at the basics and definately do not add fish. Fish that are not quarantined are only going present you with more risk of diseases.
Basics:
Water quality - cycled? Low nitrates? No ammonia or nitrites!
Temps - appropriate temps are met and held reasonably stable?
Lighting - avoid super bright lighting or don't run lights and see if that helps.
Hiding spots and aggression - make sure you have caves and that no one is being bullied
Diet - variety is key, quality foods only, no crap fillers.
Diseases - check you fish for poor coloration, physical abnormalities, wierd poops, cloudy eyes, healthy weight ect.
If you can rule out all of the above then start looking at dither fish, but quarantine first for min 2 months to be safe.
The only thing I can't exactly rule out on the list is the lighting. The light that I have is a 30 inch Finnex 24hr planted plus light. It is only 30 inches and sits on the glass canopy in the middle of the tank and it has a 24 hour day to night setting that I have it on. Its meant for growing plants but I thought for how short it is the light would not penetrate too much of the tank and would leave shadowy areas on each of the ends of the tank Do you think that possibly its too much light? They don't hide all of the time just mostly when me or anyone else approaches the tank
Something you can try is turn up the heat a bit, safe level but the higher end of the range. This will promote a faster metabolism and they will want to eat more. The activity level of the tank should go up a level too.
Next step is to feed 3 times or 2 times a day but small amounts. Keep them wanting more all the time. With a bit of time you can start leaving you hand in the tank while they are eating. They should get used to you being around often to feed.
Also try and stay low when near the tank, don't go over the top as that freaks most fish out. Floating plants are great for this too.
Next step is to feed 3 times or 2 times a day but small amounts. Keep them wanting more all the time. With a bit of time you can start leaving you hand in the tank while they are eating. They should get used to you being around often to feed.
Also try and stay low when near the tank, don't go over the top as that freaks most fish out. Floating plants are great for this too.
The first thing I noticed was the lack of cover up top, I would try some floating plants-fake or real.
You could try separating the Oscars, it shouldn't be hard to rig a temporary partition in the tank and see if that makes a difference. Poor water quality may have this effect on them too. From my own experience I'm dubious whether it would be something like lights or lack of surface cover. Temperature maybe. I would eliminate environmental factors before you go down the dither fish route.
