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About a month ago, I posted to the Hospital folder because I lost 4 of my 8 Pandas from one of those "no obvious symptoms" bugbears. After a few days of following the suggestions of the wonderfully helpful FP members, I thought I had fixed my problems -- doubled my filtration, removed caves that might have let water stagnate, started deep gravel vacuums, etc. -- but this week, I lost the remaining 4 pandas, just as suddenly and mysteriously. The only thing I can think of is that they had some type of disease/parasite and it just finally worked its way through the other half of the shoal.

My LFS doesn't have pandas in stock right now and, to be honest, if this was a disease/condition they came with, I'm not sure I should get more from the same source anyway. (Their pandas are locally bred, so their future deliveries of them would most likely be from the same tank/parents.) The LFS does have both Julii (I'm sure they're really trillineatus) and Peppered (palatus) in stock, though, and as much as I liked my Pandas, I'm wondering if I might have better luck with one of those.

So my questions are:

1) Does anyone have experience with False Julii and/or Peppered cories who could give me their opinion on them? Are they active for you? Hardy? Is 2.5" to 3" an accurate size on them? (I only have a 20 gal tank, so I need ones that stay fairly small.)

2) Assuming this was some type of disease/parasite, is there a certain time I should wait before adding new cories? I don't want to buy new ones only to find that whatever this was survived in my tank and will now kill them off, too. (My school of 9 harlequin rasboras in the tank is just fine -- whatever this was never affected them.)

Thanks for any input you can provide!

Kathy

I'll answer your second question first. I've had a similar thing happen with a shoal of six C. polystictus. They all died out over two months, presumably after a parasite was introduced via a fish from PetSmart. I personally would wait at least a month before adding any more cories, that is what I did. I now have five C. septentrionalis in the same tank the other cories were in, and they have been happily residing there for months.

The false julii (Corydoras trilineatus) cories are pretty hardy fish, and do well in a typical community setup. They aren't the most active of cories though, and seem to be a little more shy than other Corydoras species. Still, if they are given good care and lots of places to hide; they will probably prove to be fairly active. These fish do not grow very large, and are average-sized cories at two inches.

Hopefully this will help you out.

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Peppered corys are REALLY hardy, they can withstand heavy temp flucuations without a problem.

They are pretty active, and not shy at all.

I would def. recommend them to people

ALso, mine bread a few weeks after i got them.

Thanks for the info, guys.

Vic, how big did your peppereds get? I've seen everything from 2.5" to 4" -- every profile seems to have something different!

Kathy

Female peppered corys can reach almost 3" in length, while for males about 2.5" seems to be the maximum.






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My female is around 2.75" and my male is about 1.75" (maby a little more)

The male looks like a baby cory compared to the female

Hi,
I have both Trilineatus and Peppered Corys, and I can answer a couple of your questions.
Both my Trilins and my Peppers are very friendly towards myself and my hubby, and they are both extremely active corys, more so even than my Bronze and Albinos, and I have smaller schools of both than the Aenus!
My Trilins are about 2.5 inches, and my Peppers, the female is 4 inches, the male is about 2.5
I would highly recommend either cory, its just up to you for color choice! Trilins are very striking to view in a large school but Peppers are just that little bit more active, though not much in my tank.

If you have had a disease or a parasite in your tank, you really have 2 options: A) Buy the corys and quarantine them in a seperate tank/bucket/etc for 2-3 weeks B)Hold off on buying the corys until 21-29 days have passed. By this time any diseases or parasites should have run rampant and you should be pretty safe.
Good luck!


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Thanks for the great info! I'll probably go with the Trilins due to their smaller size and whiter coloring, but gosh, I really do drool over the Peppers at the LFS. They definitely seem more active, at least in the store tanks. Either way, I'll wait 3-4 weeks before getting some more. The tough part will be the wait. Thanks again!

Kathy

I've kept a lot of pepper cory's over the years and have always found them to be some of the more active and hardy of the cory's

Another advantage, if you are so inclined they will breed quite readily for you

Jim

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