Pleco digging and swimming into filter

[swifty]

After 2 months of removing my old pleco, I noticed some bad algae. After some attempted fixes, I got another bristlenose pleco. This one is a female, and 2". After 24 hours, the algae was pretty much 99% devoured.

The only downsides now, are that she is constantly digging on the right side back/front corners of the tank. I also noticed earlier, that she swam up to the outtake of my filter, and swam right up it, into the box itself where the media is at!

I dropped a small piece of carrot and broccoli in yesterday, but it hasn't been touched.

Any ideas? I don't want her to accidentally fall out when I'm not nearby.

 

[Cactuspixie]

After 2 months of removing my old pleco, I noticed some bad algae. After some attempted fixes, I got another bristlenose pleco. This one is a female, and 2". After 24 hours, the algae was pretty much 99% devoured.

The only downsides now, are that she is constantly digging on the right side back/front corners of the tank. I also noticed earlier, that she swam up to the outtake of my filter, and swam right up it, into the box itself where the media is at!

I dropped a small piece of carrot and broccoli in yesterday, but it hasn't been touched.

Any ideas? I don't want her to accidentally fall out when I'm not nearby.

Are you also giving her algae wafers?
She may be searching for food.

 

[Oohitsae]

Do you have wood in there for her? Is the tank established? Does she have any hiding places?

Seems to me like she is either trying to swim away from bad water quality, or find a good place to hide out. While my juvenile BN's are always out and about, my adults/sub adults are always hidden, so if there isn't anywhere to hide then she might be trying to find a better place to go. Check parameters and go from there, but it wouldn't hurt to give her a few caves/crevices to hide in. All my tanks that have plecos in them have 3+ pleco breeding caves, rocks for them to have books and crannies to hide in/under, and driftwood with crevices in it so they can wiggle their way under them too.

If she doesn't have a good diet she might be on a search for more food. BN's require wood to rasp on for digestion, and a veggie based diet with protein added a few times a week as well. I feed mine algae wafers, plecocaine (pellets designed specifically for plecos, which also gives them their protein)), veggie sticks, and veggies. The veggie sticks/algae wafers are their staple, but the plecocaine is fed 3x weekly with veggies at night 1-2x/week, and there is always a few sticks of cholla wood for them as well. They seem to all do very well on this diet, and it also helps them condition for spawning and grow faster.

What other tank mates does she have? Maybe someone is being a bit too aggressive and she needs to get away from it/them? Or the tank is too busy for her liking? You may have just ended up with a shy pleco

 

[swifty]

There are 8 black skirts, and a firemouth. My firemouth actually swims away from the pleco anytime she comes near.

The tank has been established going on 8 months. I actually did a re-scape when I got rid of my last pleco to limit hideouts. The big piece of driftwood that my old pleco always hid in is now in another tank, so I think its the hiding thing. There is a small piece of wood that I cut from the bigger piece in there, but I guess I'll look into some form of hiding area.

 

[swifty]

Well, I dropped a rock on the left side of my tank for some cover, and moved a piece of driftwood in from my other tank. She immediately started nibbling on the new driftwood and hid under the rock, so hopefully thatll deter it.

Before:

After: