Neon tetras + angel fish = food

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godshatter

Aquarium Advice Newbie
Joined
May 24, 2017
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I'm reposting this as its own thread as helpful advice for would be food chain experimenters.
I recently ran into an old post where someone was looking for recommendations of blue fish to add to a tank with an Angel fish. He had removed a Gourami that was bullying the angel. Several replies suggested neon or cardinal tetras as a good option. Bad idea unless your looking to up the Angel's protein intake. Even if the Angel isn't currently large enough to eat them, it will be unless you manage to kill it first.

On a tropical fish tank scale, adult Angel fish are large predatory fish. I once added neon tetras to a tank with a fairly small angel (7cm from dorsal tip to anal fin tip). They were like popcorn. After he started eating them it became a race to see who could catch them faster. He was better than me: I saved 3 out of 10.

The moral of the story is: unless you intend to feed your fish to each other - and that is probably not what someone adding neon tetras to their tank is thinking, since there are much cheaper feeder fish - then consider the size and predatory tendencies of the adult fish.

I had a similar non-fish story from my brother about a dwarf African frog he foolishly added to his aquarium. These are predators - period. Nearly all species of frogs will eat anything they can fit in their mouth, which you might notice is about as big as they are. Eventually he noticed fish under 4cm in length disappearing. He then noticed the frog was looking kind of bloated. Paying attention now, he finally saw a fish about the same size as the frog get eaten. I was in a lab once that studied the larger more aggressive African frogs. They would routinely eat each siblings that they outgrew. With most aquatic animals that will take life prey, if it can fit it in the mouth it can eat it. Frogs just happen to be mostly mouth.


In summary: always, always, always know as much as you can about anything you add to your tank - unless your intent is to see nature take its course.
 
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