hardy fishy?

[joshua]

was wondering if suckers were hardy.. are suckers all plecos?

 

[Alien Anna]

was wondering if suckers were hardy.. are suckers all plecos?

No. There are Hillstream Loaches, Chinese Algae Eaters (also known as "Sucking loaches") and ottocinclus catfish, to name a few off the top of my head.

And being bottom feeders, none of them are exactly hardy. They can't swim near to the surface to get more oxygen if things get difficult in the tank.

 

[FanOFish]

Just a question/comment....wouldn't a betta be hardy? Based on the fact that they live for years in little more than a jar with no cycling you would think they would thrive especially since they can get oxygen from the surface. Just wondering

 

[Alien Anna]

Just a question/comment....wouldn't a betta be hardy? Based on the fact that they live for years in little more than a jar with no cycling you would think they would thrive especially since they can get oxygen from the surface. Just wondering

Some bettas are quite hardy but the problem is they are often so in-bred and all those extra long fins can be quite susceptible to fin-rot.

But personally I feel it's a welfare issue. No fish, no matter how hardy, should have to deliberately endure a tank with poisoned water - it just isn't fair. And that's what we're really saying when we say we "cycle with fish". I am appalled when I hear about LFS's selling danios "just to cycle the tank", with the intention that people bring them back in two months and trade them in - those fish may have to "cycle" several tanks before they finally die from the accumaled poisonings. Then the unfortunate customer complains "But I thought you said they were hardy!" (yeah, hardy, not invincible).

Bettas generally don't last for years in jars. In fact, I'd be surprised if most of them make it to their first birthday. You get the odd survivor, but very often they die young, particularly in view of the fact that in the wild they can live 6-8 years (the average in the hobby is about 18 months to 2 years). Besides, there is a big difference between "survive" and "thrive".

 

[smb]

Like AA mentioned, I think there's a misconception about "hardy" fish when being used to cycle a tank.

Just because you cycle a a tank with fish and it lives, that doesn't mean it's hardy and didn't suffer. Because it did suffer. All fish do. Ammonia attacks the sensitive gill membranes of all fish and tears them up. This chokes them in the same way as if someone was choking us with their hands around our necks. If we live thru the choking that by no means that we were "hardy" but happened to survive...this time.

IMO, fish should never be used to cycle a tank. Not only does it tear up the gills and make them suffer but once you cycle a tank you have to go through a mini-cycle every time you add more fish to the tank until the beneficial bacteria can catch up again.

If you go with a fishless cycle, no fish are harmed, 99% of the time it takes less time..sometime as little as 10-12 days, and you can add the FULL load of fish the day it's cycled. Infact, it's better if you do add the full load of fish all at once because you have a full load of beneficial bacteria to cope with the bioload.