Need Some Advice On My Otos

[koinukun]

Hello everyone!

I recently bought 4 oto catfish about 3 weeks ago for my 40g AquaOne tank. I acclimatised them slowly, I lost 1 in the first few days but the others seem to have settled in but I'm concerned about their eating...

I have had a huge war with brown algae in my tank since I first set it up and even though my tank is fairly well planted, the algae just covers all the plant leaves and they stop growing. I wanted the otos to stop this from happening and within the first 3 days of them being in there, the tank was immaculate. Now though they seem to have stopped eating the algae and the tank looks almost as bad as it did originally.

Yet they still eat blanched courgette! So I know that they are still eating but why don't they like the algae anymore?
I hear that they were one of the best catfish for clearing up algae troubles but so far they haven't lived up to their reputation and I'm a bit disappointed...

I feed them courgette twice every week...do you think that they got addicted to this and no longer like the algae?
I though this was the case so I didn't given them any courgette in about a week, hoping that they would get back to eating the algae but nothing has happened...

Has anyone else experienced this with them or know why they would behave like this?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Athena]

Hello everyone!

I recently bought 4 oto catfish about 3 weeks ago for my 40g AquaOne tank. I acclimatised them slowly, I lost 1 in the first few days but the others seem to have settled in but I'm concerned about their eating...

I have had a huge war with brown algae in my tank since I first set it up and even though my tank is fairly well planted, the algae just covers all the plant leaves and they stop growing. I wanted the otos to stop this from happening and within the first 3 days of them being in there, the tank was immaculate. Now though they seem to have stopped eating the algae and the tank looks almost as bad as it did originally.

Yet they still eat blanched courgette! So I know that they are still eating but why don't they like the algae anymore?
I hear that they were one of the best catfish for clearing up algae troubles but so far they haven't lived up to their reputation and I'm a bit disappointed...

I feed them courgette twice every week...do you think that they got addicted to this and no longer like the algae?
I though this was the case so I didn't given them any courgette in about a week, hoping that they would get back to eating the algae but nothing has happened...

Has anyone else experienced this with them or know why they would behave like this?

Thanks in advance!

Well, they are only tiny little guys, after all - once they are full they will slow down on eating the algae. I have 4 in my tank and the same thing happened to mine - went crazy for about the first week (had probably been starved in the LFS!) but have definitely got slower since then at grazing the algae and I don't even feed mine the courgette. If your tank has plenty of algae you shouldn't need to supplement them with anything else otherwise they will get full on the courgette and not want to graze in the tank.

Having said that, my tank is still cleaner now than before I got them and I can't say I have a major algae problem any more.

Also, you can't really expect 4 little Ottos to keep a 40 gallon tank spotless continuously. My 4 Ottos are in a 2ft tank (71litres) so you might just need to get a few more Ottos if you want to increase the grazing potential? Other than that you could try to find out what's causing your bad algae problem and maybe try to correct it (maybe it's to do with lack of lighting or too much lighting etc).

Just my thoughts, anyway - Athena

 

[koinukun]

Thanks very much for your reply Athena!

I think I'm going to have to go out and buy some more of them. I was a bit sad this morning as I woke up to find another one had died during the night so now I'm left with only 2! ;_;
Delicate little things aren't they...

Also I have no idea what is causing such bad algae growth. I have lots of plants and only have the lights on for about 10 hours a day. I though it was because I may have been overfeeding my other fish so I cut their food down a bit but there has been no evidence that the algae has stopped. A few weeks before I added the otos I used some anti-algae treatment stuff but I think it killed a lot of my bacteria as I had a sudden ammonia spike after 6 months of smooth sailing. Needless to say I stopped the treatment immediately.

I also do a water change and gravel vac twice a week as it looks filthy after a few days. I blame my angelfish to be honest as he is quite a messy eater and does quite big poos now.

Thanks again!

Koinukun~