Chili Rasboras won't school

H

hotweldfire

AC Members
Sep 25, 2007
25
0
0
I've got 30-40 boraras brigittae in a (fairly) heavily planted 33g tank. Existing occupants were 7 otos, a few helena snails and a horde of cherry shrimp. I put half in about a week ago and the rest in a couple of days ago.

I wanted a large school of very small fish that would school tightly and make the tank look a lot bigger. These guys seem to mainly spread themselves around the tank and not do a lot. A few go off on their own and explore the plants but that's about it.

Spoken to a couple of LFSs about it and they think there are two issues.

1) There's no threat in the tank. One LFS has sold me 4 threadfin rainbows to try to remedy that. Beautiful fish but the chilis completely ignore them. The other LFS is suggesting I throw in a dwarf cichlid.
2) They need to be in a bigger school. First LFS say that in their experience they will school but only in very large numbers, e.g. 100+.

Alternatively, I may be that I'm being impatient given they're adjusting to a new tank and water conditions and might be a bit stressed and lethargic.

Anybody have these fish and had a similar/different experience?
 
Hard for that many fish to school/shoal in a small tank without any real threat. Numbers alone won't make it happen......
 
Even Cardinal Tetras, Harlequin Rasboras and Rummynoses will do the same thing when there's no threat. It's also my belief that they're Shoaling fish not true SCHOOLing fish. The difference is that shoals will stay near each other but only retreat to a tightly formed "school" when there's a slight threat in the aquarium such as a larger fish (don't get something that will stress them out, they're a difficult fish to get eating and their diet should consist of very small foods such as cyclops). Rummynoses are more of a true schooling fish where they swim and hunt for food as one unit regardless of threat level. Get yourself a larger fish that frequently swims around but really isn't a threat to eat them like a flying fox or two.
 
ScottKelly911 said:
It's also my belief that they're Shoaling fish not true SCHOOLing fish. The difference is that shoals will stay near each other but only retreat to a tightly formed "school" when there's a slight threat in the aquarium....
Click to expand...

jpappy789 said:
I agree with the above...no threat = no real reason to school
Click to expand...

If these fish are really shoalers, and if schooling is a stress response to a perceived threat, then I wonder if it's good for them to be kept in a constant state of stress, just to elicit the schooling behavior.

I mean, maybe it's actually a good sign that they're not schooling, because it means that they're happy in your tank :)
 
I'm very happy that they're happy in my tank but, to be brutally honest, they're not doing their job :grinno:

Aren't flying foxes a bit huge? I thought they got up to 6 inches? What do people think about the LFS suggestion of a dwarf cichlid? I thought these could be rather aggressive and also a bit sensitive re: water conditions.
 
I've never experienced my dwarf cichlids making my fish school any better. For the most part they are actually quite peaceful (except for maybe spawning, but I've only ever really kept one at a time). They can be territorial, but they usually hang around the bottom whereas most other fish are more "mid tank" swimmers.

As for being delicate...if your water is below 12 gH I wouldn't worry about it too much as long as your water quality is good. If harder than 12 gH I'd recommend Keyholes which can handle harder water than most.
 
I had a single male krib in a heavily planted tank with 5 b. urophthalmoides (exclamation point rasboras/supposed to be 12 but most died in shipping), and it didn't bother them at all. They were usually within 6 inches of each other, but since they weren't even an inch long, I didn't really observe much for schooling. It wasn't unusual to see them spread out all across the 30" long tank.
 
I have around 40 B. brigittae, too and they school loosely in my tank even with a 4" SAE and two garras close to 4". Some even compete for food with my fully grown cardinal tetras.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
AquariaCentral.com
Top Bottom