Dissapearing Pleco

[deinonychus]

This is getting ridiculous. Just a week after losing 4 of my favourite fish (mentioned in a previous thread) my pleco is now awol. Got home last night and he was nowhere to be seen. I've pulled the tank apart and he wasn't hiding anywhere!

My tank is a Juwel 125 wityh an internal filter. He shared it with tetras, three clown loaches (about 3 inches each - the same size as him) and some moonlight gouramis. He liked to crawl inside the outlet pipe - don't know if that's significant.

I can only think of the following:

Injured by the impeller by crawling into the pipe then eaten by the loaches
Loches picked on him and ate him
Buried himself under the gravel somewhere..??
Jumped out of the tank and managed to get under the sofa or something..??

All of these options seem totally bizarre and unfeasible. If he was eaten, shouldn't there be remains (bones etc around...) I last saw him about 48hrs ago.

I'd be grateful for any ideas at all...I've stripped the tank down to bare gravel and pulled the filter apart - he's nowhere to be seen....


edit - He was in the hole that the heater goes in in a Juwel internal filter....he can obviously get through holes half his size......




Cheers

 

[indigoj]

This is quite common for plecs, they are amazingly capable of vanishing. (My 9"Gibbiceps manages to disappear regularly) I only panic if they are gone more than about 3 days.

 

[dane261]

agree i rarely see my plecs and i have loads they really good at hidin




Cheers Dane

 

[Tacklebury]

Mine mananged to dig out a hole in a rock i had. Lost him for days at a time.

When i came to changing tanks, again he was no where to be seen. I then removed this massive rock and stuck it on a towl on the floor, about 20 mins later i noticed a tiny fin sticking out the bottom and that was my plec!

I stuck the stone back into the new tank and about 90 mins later he came out! Even more bizarre was the clown loach that was also trapped inside. He came out with loads of dust and marks on him from being squashed in!

Still alive and well today!

 

[Egmel]

I only panic if they are gone more than about 3 days.

Ditto! Day one you think, oh well he's probably just hiding, day 2 you think, maybe if I put some of his fave food in I'll get him to come and say hello, day 3 you're beginning to wonder whether you should go in and have a look it's at that point he waggles a fin in my direction to let me know he's ok!

 

[shelaghfishface]

they are really funny, i saw mine the first time in ages, the other day, and have had to offer him to a new home as hes grown so much since i last saw him-in other words i neglected him lol
shelagh xxx