Cleaner Fish

B

brett

Guest
Hi everyone, Is there fish that you can get to help clean the tank ive seen these lil sucker type fish in petshops in every tank doing what i think is cleaning anyway. :D
Can anyone help me...?
Sorry if this is a really dumb question...
 
hey brett, fish and axolotls do not go very well. especially the "sucker type fish". they will probably suck on the axolotls slime coat and other fish will nibble at there gills. your better of getting a couple of snails. they will help reduce algae.
 
some peoples do, some dont. mine never touched snails, they sort of just snapped at the large ones (over 2cm) as they slowly moved along. go for ramshorns, malaysian trumpets or mystery snails (they dont seem to breed as much as the above two which is good)
 
Is there ways to control breeding..?
And will the snails eat live plants...?
 
none of the above have ever eaten mine, the malaysians stay in the substrate during the day (they burrow in) and eat detrius in there, the ramshorn- not sure what they do lol, they just 'snail' all over the place and the mysteries dont do much either lol.

the ramshorn and malaysians will breed like nothing, cant really stop them, only control the population. i only ever had one mystery and it never bred, not sure if they need a partner to breed or what
 
Ok thanks for the help, so the snails would just burrow in the sand thats pritty shweet lol..
 
just the malaysians, they bury in during the day and come out at night time. the ramshorn might go into the substrate a bit (not too sure) but they go somewhere during the day and surface at night also.

mysteries just stay out all the time IME
 
So these shud b available at any petstores shouldn't they...?
 
The reason for this is that some snails are hermaphrodites. They can essentially fertilize themselves. However, mystery snails (as well as apple snails) are not, and you need a male and a female to reproduce.
 
yes they are the big yellow ones, i had to get one for my tank after both the algae eaters went missing.lol
 
i think i read somewhere that algea eaters have spikes on there backs and if the axie eats them its likely to cut into the axie. i cant remember where i read that though...
 
Alex, very true. This is why we tell people not to use algae-eating fish. They are very spiky and can be quite dangerous.
 
even though they say not to use goldfish, I use my sons two goldfish to clean sallys tank every month or so, I find that provided there are plenty of plants and food to go around then there is no nipping biting or gills missing, I do this so as to not have to keep disturbing the tank set up or water balance as i've tried to make it as lake bottom like as possible.
 
Goldfish add significant waste, both aqueous and solid. Without very heavy planting, you still need to do water changes to reduce levels of nitrates in a cycled tank. In addition to improving health, it's also more aesthetically pleasing to remove the 'gunk' on the bottom of a tank.
 
the tank has quite a few plants plus because i use pellets and jokers it means more powder layer and slime without the fish than with.
 
I kept a school of coriadorus(sp) catfish in with my three axolotls for several years. I added them to clean up food crumbs. The axolotls couldn't eat them even though they are small enough because the corys have spikes on either side just behind their heads. I did have an axolotl get a hole poked through the bottom of his mouth, but of course it healed up fine. After a few trys they realize they can't eat them and give up.
 
There have been quite a few horror stories of axolotls being impaled on cory cat fish because of those spikes. Usually both the fish and the axolotl die.
 
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