Petricola Behavior

O_o · Post by **O_o** » 10 Feb 2006, 00:17

Hello, I have around 10 petricolas in a 55gal with various Tanganyikan fish. One has made it his mission to train for Nascar, All day he swims around and around a spong filter non stop. Hes actually getting faster at doing this, all my other peticola's are fine. Its been around a week and its getting me dizzy, is this normal or do you think there is something wrong with him?

zenyfish · Post by **zenyfish** » 10 Feb 2006, 01:21

I would say normal ... to me, it's part of their appeal.

I have one that swim in horizontal circles around the tank.
Another that swim in verticle circles, towards the power filter and dives downwards as it closes on the tank wall.
I think they like the current.

danott · Post by **danott** » 10 Feb 2006, 13:12

I have 18 petricolas in a 100 gallon tank, and often find that either a single fish or a group of up to 4 or 5 will follow this behaviour. Mine will do this for several hours or a day or 2 and then stop for several days. Sometimes I will then hardly see any of them again till lights off.This behaviour can be amazingly energetic, and once they have decided on a route they stick to that route for the whole episode. My fish are immature at present, being between 2-2.5 inches. They have grown to this length from approx 1/2inch in 6 months which seems quicker than I have read elsewhere.

Rickzfish · Post by **Rickzfish** » 10 Feb 2006, 22:16

Your Petricola have grown 1.5 - 2" in 6 months?? What do you feed them, I have 2.5 yr old ones that are barely 2.5" in size.

danott · Post by **danott** » 10 Feb 2006, 22:56

My petricola are fed last thing at night with frozen bloodworn 4 or 5 times a week, and on a daily basis with TetraTabimen tablets [which they love],TetraPrima granulated food [which is fairly small and sinks quickly],and every other day with either Tetra variety wafers or Ocean nutrition algae wafers. I also occasionally place a raw tiger prawn in overnight weighted down with a lead weight [prawn must be rmoved first thing in the morning to prevent fouling]and also courgette, and tinned shelled processed peas. I must add that the petricolas share this food with some plecs and a few other fish.
The tank is quite heavily filtered and has 20% water changes weekly. Water is hard [13] and I have a coral sand base which seems to colour the petricola up nicely. Water temperature was 27'C but for the last 2 months has been reduced to 25'C.
I have heard that at least some of the other fry from the same batches I bought mine from have grown equally quickly.

DJRansome · Post by **DJRansome** » 11 Feb 2006, 17:23

Mine are growing more quickly than I expected from reading as well. Bought them at 1" end of December, and I swear they are 1.5" or more. My husband jokes they look the size of trout! Maybe they just grow quickly when really young and then take a long time for the final maturity?

Rickzfish · Post by **Rickzfish** » 11 Feb 2006, 20:26

In my experience, they grow to about 1.5" in 6 - 8 months after hatching, then the next .5" almost takes another year. I have hundreds of them, and never see them grow as fast as noted above.