mega clown pleco (L340)

[papa_bear_21]

Not sure, but I know that there are several plec's looking similiar to this one, I discovered them during my research. If I paid too much, its no biggie, I think he's worth it. I saw prices of 55+ for the L340, so I considered 30 a decent price...

[black hills tj]

I like the last shot. Neat looking little guy!

[Lance M.]

Looks good. I have two clown plecos and they look similar to your pleco but they aren't the same as yours. Yours is "flatter" then mine lol. A lot of times pleco's are miss-marked becuase they can look so similar but are different. I dont see much of mine maybe 2 or 3 times a week.

I love my L333's though. King Tigers are awesome.

[papa_bear_21]

I'm beginning to think that I need to start buying 2 pleco's to begin with. It started with my gibbi, as the first one died, and the second one lived. My common, first one died, second one seems to be doing great. Now, my clown has died . I think I know why, as I believe I am experiencing a mini cycle, as my ammonia spiked to 1, and nitrites are beginning to spike. Can not having enough gravel be the cause of this? we did not add any additional gravel when we upgraded to the 55 from the 29, we have some to add tonite when we do a PWC. I know we dont want to do too much at once, as that can only make matters worse, we have a total of 10 pounds I believe to add, which is not enough as of yet. We will continue to slowly add more and more gravel until a good depth is reached. Once we get the tank stable again, we will then begin to decide on our restocking options, as we have lost many fish.

[Lance M.]

Yes I would go ahead and add the gravel. When I upgraded to my 54 gallon, I took all the gravel from my 20 gallon, 10 gallon, and 5 gallon along with all the plants so there was no cycle. Sorry to hear you lost your pleco and some fish.

[papa_bear_21]

such is life in the aquarium world, I will track down another clown pleco to complete my tank again. or track down the Angelicus pleco we want...we'll see, My Gibbi is getting big, so we gotta watch who we bring home anymore, dont want to over crowd the plecos...we will be adding the gravel during the partial change tonite, hopefully no one gets buried...

We have ~25 pounds in there, going to be adding ~10, putting us to ~35 pounds, will another ~20 pounds be good, or will 15 do? how much gravel is good in a 55 gallon tank?

[papa_bear_21]

Gravel added, putting us up to about 35 pounds, roughly a half inch above the black on the bottom of the tank. we will likely add another 20 pounds in the next week...