I have a dojo loach who is the undisputed star of my tank. I love this fish.
Here's the story. These guys are supposed to enjoy burying themselves in the substrate, sometimes with only their whiskers sticking out. I noticed mine trying to force his way into the gravel but the particles were too big. So I got some sand, fine-grained but not tiny. Now he's got his own little sand box. So far he hasn't figured out how to bury himself, though. But he did sleep in it the first night. I've been burying food for him in the sand to try to teach him to burrow.
My concern is that, when he sifts around for the food, sand particles come out through his gills. I'm probably being paranoid, but that seems like it would damage such delicate structures. The other fish just pick up a mouthful of sand and spit out the sand through their mouths.
Also, when the time comes that he when he does learn how to burrow, won't breathing under there get sand in his gills? Could the little silica pieces (after all, sand is the same stuff as glass) scratch his eyes, too? After all, he can't close his eyelids or exhale through the tip of his snout.
Here's the story. These guys are supposed to enjoy burying themselves in the substrate, sometimes with only their whiskers sticking out. I noticed mine trying to force his way into the gravel but the particles were too big. So I got some sand, fine-grained but not tiny. Now he's got his own little sand box. So far he hasn't figured out how to bury himself, though. But he did sleep in it the first night. I've been burying food for him in the sand to try to teach him to burrow.
My concern is that, when he sifts around for the food, sand particles come out through his gills. I'm probably being paranoid, but that seems like it would damage such delicate structures. The other fish just pick up a mouthful of sand and spit out the sand through their mouths.
Also, when the time comes that he when he does learn how to burrow, won't breathing under there get sand in his gills? Could the little silica pieces (after all, sand is the same stuff as glass) scratch his eyes, too? After all, he can't close his eyelids or exhale through the tip of his snout.