PlanetCatfish.com

hi there
can't seem to find my male common bristlenose in my 75 gallon tank. well established tank, parameters normal, female bristlenose and male yellow brislenose seem OK. recent unexplained death of female yellow balck eyed bristlenose has got me worried. lifted up one of the ornaments - no sign of him. it's been about a week and a half since i last saw him. havn't lifted up driftwood - thought maybe (hopefull) he is guarding some eggs, hiding away. he is more shy than the others.

what do you guys reckon? feel upset, not sure what to do.











 

They can wedge themselves into surprisingly tight cracks n crevices in bogwood, they also blend in well. I once thought I'd lost mine as he'd disappeared, I took the tank apart, eventually heard him croaking away in a wedge in the bogwood that I'd taken out of the tank while searching, he was fine and guarding his eggs...

If he's died and the others have had a good feast you would find bits of his armour in the substrate... a bit gross.

The other possibility is that the other male has been attacking him, they are extremely agressive towards each other IME. My male attempted to murder a giant ramshorn snail yesterday morning. He crept up to it, unfurled his cheek spines and vicously stabbed the poor snail which fell to the bottom of the tank in a plume of blood. Nasty little oik. If your male was more shy then I would say that the other male has been beating him up overnight, in which case I doubt if it'd be him guarding any eggs... He might have got cornered and jumped out of the tank, in which case I'm afraid that you might find a dehydrated husk somewhere on the floor, sorry. Hopefully he is just really good at hiding though, they do seem to be. If you do find him I would move him to another tank where he can have some peace from the other male.

thanks for your reply dancingdrayad. i think it's unlikely he's jumped out of the tank (hopefully anyway) - he is dominant to the other plecs (he chased everyone else round) and the tank is sealed pretty tight with a wooden cover over the glass lid.

hopefully i'll find him soon, with little babies! i have only been recently (last month or so) feeding them vegies, so they might've been conditioned.

yay he turned up today looking none the worse. no babies seen though. now the female is gone ?taking turns looking after babies? just glad he's ok though.

Hurrah!

The females don't have any interest in tending the eggs and the male will stay fanning them until they hatch, he won't tolerate any other fish near the eggs. There might be some babies about though, they do stay very well hidden in the nest until they lose their yolk sac or fall out.

They do go "missing" sometimes. They are very good at hiding when they feel like.

If the male is just missing for a couple of days, it's just normal "hiding" stuff. If he's missing for a week or more, then it's probably fanning the eggs from the female.

Of course, it could be that they mated and the first spawn didn't go well, so the male ate the eggs (if they fungus, the male will eat them). Sometimes, the first spawn isn't fertile, so the male may have sat on eggs for a day or two, then eaten them and come out as the eggs didn't develop.

But without asking him, we can't tell...

Best of luck.

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Mats