pepper cory vs bronze/green

[tomherndon]

in the last two weeks, I've lost both of my Pepper Cories, but my green/bronze cories are doing fine. The peppers were almost a year YOUNGER than the others.

Is there anything out there disease wise that affects one cory set over the other.

Rest of the tank is tetras/rasboras/danios/otos and a couple of amanos (the peppers were the largest in there)

I did the usual, pH low7, NO3 under 5ppm KH around 4o (so reasonably buffered)

The tank is moderately planted with java fern on wood and some waterlettuce/duckweed on top. There's a heap of beard algae - but that's been with the Java fern in the tank longer than any of the current inhabitants.

 

[hacket]

What about ammonia? What size tank?

 

[cwt]

maybe too late to tell, but what did the barbels (whiskers) look like? Supposedly if the cories lose their barbels, they stop eating.

 

[tomherndon]

The barbel condition was not determinable.

water conditions:
with the pH a hair above 7 (colorimetric scales aren't all that) and the KH a few degrees up, I didn't think there'd be a significant ammonia count. ammonia concentration should push the pH up considerably. The tank is a 30 gallon long with two aquaclear 200 (the old 50gal) pulling water through three cycle sponges in each. I've changed out 3-5 gallons three times over six weeks as I've been clearing some of that beard algae off the sides and gravel. The last parameter check was before a cleaning/changing.

I'll try to get an ammonia reading tonight and check on the two remaining cories. And start thinking about future catfish? Do Julii cories get as large as the peppers? I'm thinking about panda cories, but the lfs hasn't had them in a while. I like how they stay small (and allow me to have MORE of them!) Really this means I need to look at the next size or two up so I can make bigger schools of everything mwa ha ha ha ha.

 

[tomherndon]

I checked the ammonia and had my more color discerning wife double check my colors and on the API kit, it came out yellow/0ppm ammonia.

The shrimp are fine in there as well, most threads I've read imply that shrimp/invertebrate health are fair indicators of tank conditions.

The barbels on the green cories are several mm in length.