What's up with my Bloodfin's??

[cjldad]

I've asked and others have verified their Bloodfin's do in fact swim at mid to top level in their tank.. I'm trying to figure what's the deal with mine.. I have 14 of them along with 8 Schwartzi Cory's... I'm running a standard 75g with play sand substrate.. Have several large pieces of driftwood and a few plants (4).. Running a Rena Xp4 with the spray bar along one end spraying down the length of the tank breaking the water surface.. Have a low tech T5NO light fixture.. Running 28w 10k and 28w actinic.. So nothing crazy bright, but looks as though they like to just stay hidden all the time.. Water params are as should be.. 0 ammon, 0 nitrite, trace nitrate, 7ph.. The bloodfins have been in the tank for 10 days now..

Of the 14 bloodfins, 1 of them stands out and looks smaller with more of a silver metalic colored body with dark red fins and happily swims around the top.. The other 13 have more of a whiteish silvery color than a metalic silver color that seem to lose the red coloring on them throughout the day with the light on and hate to go higher than 3 inches from the bottom.....

It's agrivating to look at the tank and see nothing happening because they are all hanging out at the bottom...

Thanks for any insight!

 

[Blueiz]

What is your tank temperature, what do you have for hiding spots? It sounds to me like something is stressing them.

 

[cjldad]

I always forget something... Tank temp is 76-77...

The driftwood basicly creates the hiding spots for them...

I think it is the light... But it is about as dim as it can get with the current bulb setup...

 

[Blueiz]

They will get used to the light. Depending on how long you have had them, they may still be trying to adjust to the new enviroment. Do they school together?

 

[cjldad]

Today would be 11 days since I put them in the tank.. They do school from time to time...

I watched them closely this morning before turning on the light... They were schooling together pretty well.. And would even pop out from the bottom every now and then to explore.. However, they got under anything they could find once the light came on....

 

[Blueiz]

Having another fish in there would probably help there shyness, do you plan on adding anymore?

 

[cjldad]

I have the 8 Cory's in there right now.. I went ahead and added those thinking maybe they would spook the tetras in to coming out and make them stick together.. But the tetras think nothing and run right over them..

I would like another school of something.. I like black neon tetras, also looking at some dwarf gouramis.. Thoughts?

 

[i3k]

One of my tanks has 2 silver dollars...they hate the lights too. They just don't want to get used to it. Tried different bulbs and they still don't like it. I just moved the light fixture to one side of the tank so only half of the tank gets light. My rainbows love the light and get very intense colors under the lights. So my rainbows will play in the lit section of the tank while the 2 silver dollars will play in the dim section of the tank. It kind of works out

 

[cjldad]

Hope the tetras get used to it..
They will be donated to someone on Craigslist or to the LFS..

 

[Blueiz]

For a 75 g, I would go with a standard gourami, I'm fond of the gold ones myself, but there are a lot of attracive ones out there that are ok for communities as long as they have enough space. I have 3 gold ones (2 f and 1 m) and 2 blue ones (1m and 1f) in my 75 with assorted tetras, and other fish. I've never had a prob with them.

You may also consider a lone angel.

I think that if you put a larger fish in that will draw the tetras out..

 

[cjldad]

You don't think the dwarf gouramis would be large enough to do that job of drawing them out? I am really trying to stay under stocked and I thought the larger gouramis had a bad temper at times..

 

[Blueiz]

Dwarf gouramis have a worse temper . From my experience with the blue and gold gouramis, they are not aggressive at all. I have alos had the moonlight gourmais that were very peaceful. Do a search on gouramis, there are several different types that range in several sizes and temperaments. My blue and gold ones are about 4-5 inches, so not very large at all.

 

[cjldad]

Interesting.. All of my knowledge is coming from liveaquaria and it was showing the dwarf gouramis to be peaceful and the non-dwarf to be semi-aggressive.. Figures, as I had my eye set on a pair of dwarfs at the LFS...