Large Clown Loaches are capable of eating small fish. If kept fed well on other food small fish might be ok to keep with them.
Clown loaches with smaller fish?
- Thread starter Quo Vadis
- Start date
I had 2 small kuhli loaches with my school of clowns which were all about 6 inches. They completely ignored the loaches. I had 2 large redhooks in this tank and never had any promblems. The loaches were just ignored, I think you would be fine.
Hunting feeders could be an acquired trait from observing predatory tankmates during a feeding frenzy. It may be as simple as monkey-see, monkey-do. If raised with small fish and receiving small foods CLs may be fine with their smaller tankmates. If raised with predatory species, CLs may adopt the feeding frenzy trait and tear up smaller non-tankmate feeders.
I would agree that those types of things can be learned. That's where the problem lies - I really don't know what to expect of these clowns because I have only had them about 2 weeks. I got them for free from someone who had them in a tank with a big colony of yellow labs, and some random big fish like a pacu, black shark, etc. I have no idea what he fed the tank, or if they every bothered the inevitable baby labs...
Maybe I'll put a small test fish in the quarantine with them and see how they react.
Maybe I'll put a small test fish in the quarantine with them and see how they react.
My old CL's were like a pack of wolves. I used to feed my Silver Aro live smelt and the CL's eventually started taking them down and devouring them.
I think they learned that the smelt was food from the Aro.
Bad pic, but here they are feasting:
I think they learned that the smelt was food from the Aro.
Bad pic, but here they are feasting:
