I forgot how many posters on here are keyboard warriors,
DO MOAR REESERCH!
I don't feel the need to defend myself, but i'll do my best to tell you what happened. For the last year, these guys have been going at it- usually messing with eachother, and competing with one another for shrimp pellets and small feeders (yes, the pleco goes after feeders). The Pleco always wants the Aro's food, and usually pays the price- as the aro was aggressive towards the pleco when it came time to defend his food. The pleco was contantly missing scales, but for the most part- the Aro stayed on top and the Pleco stayed on bottom, and it never seemed like one was stressed out enough to die. After i fed them last night, i noticed the pleco acting very aggresive and using it's tail fin as baseball bat to attack the silver. I heard them knock the lid off the tank while i was asleep (its happened a few times)
this morning i come to find, the aro upside down, at the bottom of the tank, gaping for air- and the pleco was swimming on top of him, sucking on his face, and the aro couldnt get away- he was trying to but the pleco RAMMED him into the glass. i imagine he just rammed him, until the stress nearly killed him.
ballinouttacntrol;4453498; said:
The arow didn't look like it'd outgrown the tank to me, especially considering it doesn't use it's full body length to turn around.
he had more than enough room to turn around, he was due for a tank upgrade soon- but it wasnt a cramped situation. It was just a pleco and a silver, nothing else.
and to the other poster- the gem stone was an amethyst propped up with a piece of drift wood- the aro never cut himself on it- and it was laid flat
(this was used with 2 flash bulbs, its only 1 aro, the same fish)
he always had great red coloring, always had a healthy diet- and normal growth- about 11 inches total.
also: the pleco and aro are (were) the same length...which i thought would be a healthy tank mate- it seemed to work for awhile.
So to recap:
He was perfectly healthy last night. PERFECTLY. swimming around, healthy eating- healthy color, EVERYTHING NORMAL.
a battle went down when the lights went off, and the pleco won.