Indo Datnoid Help

Cowboy4LifeNYP

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Mar 18, 2016
6
19
3
Hey Everyone!

I'm fairly new to the hobby. I started in early November 2015. So I have a serious question. I recently acquired a 5-6" Indo Datnoid. I bought it because of its stable bars. I put it in my tank and it immediately hid. I wasn't too cautious because my other datnoid hides when the light is on, but comes out when its a dark blue light. Anyways, I have noticed in the past 2 days that my newly acquired Datnoid stays to the bottom right corner of the tank. He will lay flat on its side. Also it will try to swim up the side of the tank but can only make it barely half-way up the tank.

When my other datnoid gets stressed, I know it will turn black and its bars become unstable. However, my new datnoid will still show bright gold with full stable black bars. So I'm a bit confused as to what could be the problem. What could be wrong with my datnoid? Any suggestions?
 

Cowboy4LifeNYP

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Mar 18, 2016
6
19
3
looks like it's struggling to swim, does it just drop when it comes back down or it slowly descends? It's tail looks all beat up. Was it like that when you first got it? I dont think you could upload videos on this site. You will need to upload it to youtube and post a link here.
Honestly I don't know too much information about it. I bought if from someone on Saturday. He had 5 Dats and claimed that his biggest one, which was all black, beats up on all of the others. He said when it's feeding time, he will get up and swim, etc. But when I tried to feed him, he stayed at the bottom. He stays in a little corner off to itself.
 

krichardson

Bronze Tier VIP
MFK Member
Jun 19, 2006
27,599
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Datnoid Island
Everything that you have described sounds like normal datnioides behavior.Your newer dat is not yet comfortable enough to move around the tank,especially since it knows that there is another dat in there.
 

dgsxdad

Plecostomus
MFK Member
Oct 19, 2007
46
26
51
San Francisco
Agreed with krichardson. And just from a personal experience, when I only had 2 dats together, one got bullied so much it wouldn't eat and had the same tendencies your describing. Dats tend to do better with just 1 in a tank or more than 3 IMO.

 

krichardson

Bronze Tier VIP
MFK Member
Jun 19, 2006
27,599
14,528
480
Datnoid Island
Agreed with krichardson. And just from a personal experience, when I only had 2 dats together, one got bullied so much it wouldn't eat and had the same tendencies your describing. Dats tend to do better with just 1 in a tank or more than 3 IMO.
Yep,most people like to keep multiple dats in a tank but they are actually solitary fish and they love to lurk and hide in the shadows in the wild.
 

dat_tiger

Piranha
MFK Member
Jul 15, 2008
436
120
76
boston
Everything that you have described sounds like normal datnioides behavior.Your newer dat is not yet comfortable enough to move around the tank,especially since it knows that there is another dat in there.
It's normal behavior for some dats to lay there but it's not normal for them to swim up and just drop when they run out of energy to keep themselves up. It would be the best for the op to get a video of its swimming behavior.
 
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