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MALE APISTO SEEMS POORLY

A

Antipofish

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I am a bit concerned about my male Apistogramma Cacatuiodes. For the past couple of days he has been 'lurking' at the top of the tank, out of the way of the other fish. Tank details are as follows...

Medium planted 80x45x55 (175L) tank.
Lighting and CO2 same as normal (DC gets nowhere near lime green and all other fish not in any distress).
CO2 on 2 hours before lights, which are 2x24w T5 on for 7 hours, CO2 off 1 hour prior to lights out.

Have done ammonia, nitrite tests at 6 hourly intervals over last 24 hours and no indication of these, or of chlorine (as far as test kits can identify). Used PRIME dechlor at last water change.

Only changes are that the last water change was quite an invasive one as per Ceg's suggestion o rid the tank of a lot of plant detritus (which worked well), 10 stems of Hygrophila were removed and the redmoor root wood which formed a cave has been turned through 90degrees to prevent detritus collecting under it.

The female apisto seems fine, and I cannot see that she is guarding fry at all. The other fish (1 otto, 2 flying fox, 3 dwarf neon rainbows and 7 rummynose tetras) are all fine.

He does venture to eat at feeding time. His fins are not clamped.

Any suggestions or ideas would be welcome, thanks. I am going to replace the redmoor wood the way it was so the cave is back in place, and see if that cheers him up a bit.
 
Anyone ? The poor bugger seems to be going downhill and I cannot work out why ?
 
they do better than other dwarf cichlid species in harder water, but they don't do great. I think George is right...I was chatting to the guy i got mine off and they will do upto about 12-14Gh, but will only last a couple of months in anything higher.
 
George Farmer said:
I wonder if he's unhappy with your harder water? I have always read Apistos do best in soft water.

dw1305 (Darell) knows his Apistos. Maybe worth PMing him or asking him to post here for everyone's benefit.
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ianho said:
they do better than other dwarf cichlid species in harder water, but they don't do great. I think George is right...I was chatting to the guy i got mine off and they will do upto about 12-14Gh, but will only last a couple of months in anything higher.
Click to expand...

Thanks guys but I am not sure its that. According to my SERA hardness test kit, my dGH is 8 which is only midway between soft and hard. Carbonate hardness (if that is relevant ?) is only 3dKH.

I will PM Darell though, thanks. :( I really love that little fish. I have rummy nose who are redded up and the female Apisto is happy as larry.
 
Hi all,
I don't think it is a water hardness issue and I'm not sure, but an Apistogramma at the top of the tank is never a good sign, you could try putting a bit of drain pipe in (so it give it a cave up near the top of the tank), and that will at least make him less stressed.

The usual reasons for them being near the top are that they don't have any territory near the bottom where they can go without being attacked, or that they aren't well, and know that they can't defend their territory, and wish to avoid territorial disputes. I'd try putting the cave back, he may return to it.

Although they are one of the easier Apistogramma spp. to keep, they are still quite sensitive and unforgiving of loss of water quality etc.

This isn't what you want to hear, but when something similar happened to mine, they had a Camallanus infestation, and I ended up euthanasing all of them. If it was something like this he will probably be very thin, and with mine they never got to the stage where the worms protruded. I eventually treated this with Levamisole, after Flubenol had proved ineffective.

Another thing with the males, is that they aren't very long lived, my oldest male was only just over 2 years old, although I've had females last until they were 4 years old.

Sorry I couldn't offer any better advice.

cheers Darrel
 
Thanks for the post Darrel. I have removed some plants and changed the wood he used as a cave. However this was only about 10 stems of Hygrophila and the wood did still afford some cover (I have put it back as it was this morning but he was still in the same hiding location tonight when I got in, to where I left him). I have noticed he does venture into the tank sometimes though. But soon returns to his place at the top just behind the spraybar. I think thats giving him cover as much as anything else I could add at present to be honest. He is not particularly old so I dont think its age related. Will see how things pan out over the next couple of days :(

I have two flying foxfish in there whuich are not particularly big, about 2", but have noticed them getting a little stroppy, but nothing I would expect an Apisto to not cope with. The rest of the fish, apart from the female, are perfectly peaceful. Its a big enough tank for them to get out of the way. Grrr. I hate sick fish and not knowing the cause.
 
Thanks everyone for your comments. I think this was a case of "SFS" (stroppy female syndrome). I sat and watched the tank for several hours and he seemed happy enough to venture into the tank on occasion but got chased back by the female every time. In fact she had the right blahblahblahblah with everyone ! In the interests of communal harmony in my tank, the pair are now back at the LFS. If the tank isn't big enough for him to exist without hiding behind the spraybar they would be better off elsewhere I feel.
 
should have bought him a pair of trousers! ;)
 
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