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At that size Heidi, they should be well past being juveniles. You should be safe. Even so, treat them with a fair amount of TLC on arrival, and try and arrange for their arrival to take place after a water change and gravel vac. Furhtermore, if you can obtain a decent supply of live Bloodworms to feed them on, this will also help their acclimatisation, as live foods work absolute wonders with Pandas. They work wonders with most fish species, but somehow Pandas seem to benefit especially well from a good Bloodworm banquet. Mata Hari and her suitors in the Panda Fun Palace™ are a case in point!


Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

Corys hate nitrates and salty water...so don't add salt like u do with the water like you do with guppies.....when i bred (succesfully) my pandas i found that it is quite difficult to raise them on bbs due to these being salty (as they r hatched in salty water)...try cutting down on the brineshrimp containig foods (imho worth a try)

Ps
You get fish for v expensive prices there
In malta we get peppered and bronze cories for 20c each approx $0.5

Good deal, cories are awesome fish.

Your peppered cories are Corydoras paleatus, a large, hardy, and common species.

An all-cory tank would be a really neat idea, and you could try to breed them in that tank. I will suggest that if you do go with just cories, stick to species that don't exceed two and a half inches in max length. The larger cories would definitely appreciate a bigger tank, so smaller species are needed.

Last edited by sirbooks at 25-Jun-2005 21:45

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And when he gets to Heaven, to Saint Peter he will tell: "One more Marine reporting, Sir! I've served my time in Hell."

Sorry it has been such a long time since i got to get back on the topic but i have been trying to get that summer job and i have added a few new loaches to my tanks which i will post on shortly.
In the 30 gallon- I innitially bought 3 Corydoras aenus (green). The substrate was the plain old Amazonian style gravel(not sharp)
In the 29- 6 peppered cories. Dont know the scientific name though. They're really common and only cost $2.99 where i live. Substrate was Eco complete for the planted Aquarium. This is really soft.
None of them showed signs of illness or anything and stopped eating the day of their death. They were fed flakes, sinking tablets, shrimp pelletes, Frozen bloodworms/brine shrimp.
Thanks for all the info everyone. I might be able to use a spare 10 gallon that is just siting around for just corydoras cats. I'll let you all know.

That was actually Cory_Di who had trouble with her habrosus and fluorite. Plus, habrosus have been documented elsewhere as being fussy vis-a-vis substrate. The Lambourne book covers this, for example.


Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

i dont see how substrait would have anything to do with barbel erosion

i have kept corys on, sand, jagged gravel, and soft gravel, and i can see they LOVE sand sifting through their gills was a fav activity, and now they hate me for changing substrait and so do i im not used to having all this stuff in the gravel im going back to sand asap only not the stuff i had before it was so fine, it would trap that nasty air, it u have to air it every day, so, im gunna go with the pool filter sand i hope my corys like it they r the reason i keep changing it they just now started comthing back out from hiding and its been a month or...3 maybe

Uh Oh Sorry CorryAddict I have gone and flipped people againOne of these days I'll get some sleep and be just fine, until then someone help me who was it? I'm sorry Really I am, "if I only had a brain...." heidi

EDITSorry Natalie, I was aiming at Diane, right Diane you had the problem with the little dainties and the rough substrate, right? Please, say I haven't lost all my mind againit really is too young to go out on it's onheidi

Last edited by houston at 20-Jun-2005 21:00

"I've got a great ambition to die of exhaustion rather than boredom." Thomas Carlyle

I know CoryAddict had trouble at one point with her dainties, because of her substrate.

I've never owned Corydoras habrosus...

Quite the opposite, really. I have never found barbel erosion of other problems related to substrate. I have kept corys on jaggad substrates such as Fluorite and never had problems; the corys always had long, healthy barbels.

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

well..as said...cories in general r sensitive to water conditions (duh!! what fish isnt..heheh)
anyways, doing regular water changes with gravel vac will keep ur cories happy. the mysterious death really hard to determine at times just like what happened to my panda..i had for a long time..then one of them just died..for no apparent reason...decided to buy new ones and another died...then after that...everyones back to normal.
hope things will be fine... gud luck

Hello All. What is your secret to keeping these catfish? I have tried keeping them in my 29 gallon and my 30 gallon. Over the span of about three months, they all started dropping dead. Not at one time, but at a rate of 2 or so weeks inbetween eachother. I had 3 in my 30 last year. I thought they died because they werent in a proper sized group so when i set up my 29 gallon, i added 6 of them. They all died gradually too. I was chatting with someone and they said that cories hate nitrates. This would explain why they died in the 30 but not in the 29. I always get a reading of =to Or less than 10 ppm in my 29.
Also,ph 7.0-7.2, gh-8, Ammonia-0ppm,nitrite-0ppm. does phosphate hurt them? My test kit says i have 10 ppm of it. I have tried lowering it, but nothing helps.

So Cali if the Pandas are about 1.5 inches (sorry you know my use of the metric system)) they should be ok to come to a new home? Amazingly my 125s water parameters are:
Ammonia=0
Nitrites=0
Nitrates=0
pH=6.7

Think I should be ok with the new little guys I want to get? And no I have no idea why I don't have Nitrates...I figure it has to do with the plants :%)

Just want to make sure that I don't hurt the little guys, I plan on getting them tomorrow

Heidi



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"Is it possible,
That we are each others soul mates
and when there is a man
they are just there for added enjoyment?"--SITC
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"I've got a great ambition to die of exhaustion rather than boredom." Thomas Carlyle

Usually, high nitrates are cited as a stress factor with Corydoras, which goes some way toward explaining why I give my Pandas the frequency of water changes I do

In any case, Pandas are noted for the following attributes:

[1] Very young juveniles are e to being killed off by shocks induced by sudden changes of water chemistry. If youdon't know how young or old they are, regard them as being under 20 weekold juveniles, and treat them as delicate. Acclimatise slowly. Perform a water change on the destination aquarium before you pick them up for optimum acclimatisation. It's not overdoing it to spread the acclimatisation over 3 hours with a drip feed or occasional exchanges of bag water with aquarium water.

[2] Likewise, high temperatures will see off juveniles in short order. Anything over 26°C kills fry in my experience, and even though adults can stand 28°C for limited periods, they don't like it. Pandas prefer temperatures of the order of 22°C or 23°C for maintenance.

[3] Adult Pandas are definitely more robust than juveniles. Which is why I tend to worry when I see really small ones offered for sale. Below 20 weeks of age, they're just not tough enough to survive major shocks. Far better to wait until they are a decent size, or they've been living in the dealer aquarium for a week without any losses. If they survive transit to the dealer aquarium and stay alive for a week, chances are they'll survive in your own aquarium. Provided of course that ...

[4] Nitrates are nice and low. Pandas tend to be among the first of the Corydoras to show distress if levels are too high.

[5] The water pH is between 6.4 and 7.6. Excess acidity in particular will kill them off like flies.

[6] The gravel bed is clean. Perform a major deep gravel vac before acquiring them, and this will go a long way toward helping them acclimatise. Gunky gravel beds will see them off in pretty short order. Pandas like clean homes!

[7] In my experience, Pandas like a gravel substrate. ROUNDED particles are the order of the day. If the gravel feels 'sharp' to your hands, don't use it. I've kept Pandas over a variety of gravel beds, ranging from 1.5mm particle size to 4mm particle size, and I'd say around 2mm to 2.5mm is the optimum size. But, nice rounded particles minus sharp edges is a priority.

[8] If you can get live food for them, get it. Corydoras catfishes of all species will relish live Bloodworms in particular. Once they start munching on the "red spaghetti", you'll practically see them smiling! And as a conditioner both to keep disease at bay and prime them for spawning, live food has almost no equal. Watch what happens when you combine a water change/gravel vac with subsequent live food banquets - in the case of my Pandas, it's all systems go, and Mata Hari starts getting in the mood to tease the boys in no time ...

Follow the above guidelines, and Panda keeping should be reasonably successful. Of course, in fishkeeping there's always a gap between 'should be' and 'is' for many people, even experienced hands, but the above should mitigate against the worst calamities.

Other, hardier Corydoras will also benefit from the same care and diligence. Indeed, if you lavish lots of TLC on them, treat them as honoured guests, and provide them with a weell-filtered home full of live plants and interesting nooks and crannies among intricate bogwood decorations for them to explore, then they'll probably reward you with the patter of tiny fins in no time. Pandas become mature and able to spawn at around 9 months of age, and I'd suspect that similar timescales hold with other species.

Hopefully, this little lot will prove useful.


Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

In my experience, unfortunately the prettier corys seem susceptible to react badly to water conditions. The hardiest seem to be Corydoras Aenus (bronze and albino corys). They do better in an established tank which of course, has stabilsed. I keep mine in planted tanks.

I believe water conditions to be key to keeping these wonderful fish.

"Over the span of about three months, they all started dropping dead. Not at one time, but at a rate of 2 or so weeks inbetween eachother."

Sounds familiar. I had a problem with some of my C. polystictus doing just this, dying off slowly and without obvious symptoms. My guess is that a parasite was introduced by way of a lemon tetra I bought (it didn't last the night) to up the school. The cory deaths started happening soon after the lemon incident, so my guess is that a parasite killed them all. None of my other fish were affected.

This has happened to several other people as well; their cories just die mysterious deaths. It seems like it's something internal, but it is so far impossible to tell what.

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And when he gets to Heaven, to Saint Peter he will tell: "One more Marine reporting, Sir! I've served my time in Hell."

houston is right they do need fine substraigh to avoid damaging their delicait babels and i don't have a phosfate test kit so i'm not sure about the correct levels o phosphate but i think they shouln't ecseed 3 or so ppm

does phosphate hurt them? My test kit says i have 10 ppm of it. I have tried lowering it, but nothing helps.

so this may be one of the causes of their deaths
hmmm but ya know i think corys are meant to be easy sort o fish to keep but i've never kept 'em before so im not sure
declan

What type of cories did you have? Pandas are very sensitve to water quality, and I think, though I am not sure, that the smaller cories can be more delicate. If I am wrong, I hope someone wiser is able to correct my misinformation.

There are all sorts of reasons why they didn't make it...

What kind of substrate are you using in your tank? I know CoryAddict had trouble at one point with her dainties, because of her substrate.

I had trouble for unknown reasons with my Juliis, yet my metaes are breeding and everyone else is doing great

There are so many different reasons why they could be unhappy

What kinds of corries have you tried? some are more delicate than others. This could be your problem as well...

Did you have any signs before they died? Anything unusual with the bodies afterwards? Were they getting plenty of food? Unfortunately sometimes it is really hard to say...

Sorry for babbling on, heidi



"I've got a great ambition to die of exhaustion rather than boredom." Thomas Carlyle