Chinese Algae Eater gets a bad rap

[Sonia Green]

Hi everyone, can I just say that I have one Chinese Algae Eater in my community tank with a dwarf golden sucking fish (name unknown, if you know it's proper name please tell me) and 6 Cory's.

This fish has only ever sucked the glass or over the substrate looking for food. He spends a lot of his time hiding in the rock I provided with the golden one, otherwise he likes to play with all the others. My 8 fish have made themselves a family who eat and play together, and occasionally a cory will visit the suckers in the cave. This is usually to entice the suckers out to play.

All my fish have been together for over two months now with no damage done and no aggressive behaviour. I feel for those of you who have had a bad experience with this fish in the past, but that's not to say they should all be tarred with the same brush. Also I should state that I previously had two of these fish with a pair of goldfish (the petshop at the time sold them as coldwater fish) and they were both fine two, I only sold them with the goldfish because I decided to go tropical.

Maybe it's because my fish need not attack the slime coats on other fish, because they all get an abundance of food each day (meaning they get small feeds several times rather than one or two bigger feeds, this way they get a variety, as I first give them bloodworm for breaky, then a feed of flake mid morning, at lunch they get a sinking pellet food and algae wafer, another feed of flake mid arvo, and then for dinner they get bine shrimp. All feeds are tiny amounts and quickly eaten, but this way they get a staple diet that covers each of their individual favourites.)

Sonia

[Silurus]

How big is your CAE? They usually don't become really mean until they are a certain size

a dwarf golden sucking fish

That's another CAE. Probably not a good idea to have two in the same tank.

[Barbie]

Most of us that don't like them as a species are speaking from personal experience. While your mileage may vary, you'll be hard pressed to dispute the problems we had with them by the time yours are 5 inches.

Barbie

[Sonia Green]

My CAE is approx 2 inches in size. The dwarf is 1 inch and has stopped growing. Can I confirm with someone which is which my larger one is silver with spots, I read somewhere that the chinese or was it siamese had a black stripe down it's side? Mine has no stripe just spots. But either way all fish are getting along great, but will keep an eye on the situation.

Sonia

[Sonia Green]

I made a mistake, the grey one does have a black stripe, but it's only down one side, the other side is completely spotted. Confusion reigns!

[Taratron]

As well, two months is not a worthy duration to say that something works perfectly fine in your tank, and you did not give the tank specifics. In a 125 gallon tank, CAEs might get along fine with other inhabitants, until maturity. In a 10 gallon, the peace treaty holds much less time.

Give us the same claim in two years, when your CAE are matured, along with a body count of zero from other inhabitants, and I'll be more likely to believe it.