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Can anyone tell me if I have 2 different dojo loach species or some sites to check out? I looked at loaches.com but while there were plenty of first hand acounts of people keeping them there was only a couple posts on the different species and those didn't help much. Maybe they are all just Misgurnus anguillicaudatus.

I bought one dark mottled brown loach from a shop also selling albino dojos and another 3 from a different shop. The 3 new ones are lighter color(even when not stressed) with a thicker front and a flatter taller tail. They are kind of faded yet but the darkest one has spots on it's back and tail with a light stripe going down it's middle and maybe one nearer it's back. They also have longer barbels and dig in the substrate more than the first one. As soon as I put them in they started burrowing under rocks where the first one is more content to sit on top of the substrate under the driftwood. They seem a bit too different both in body shape and behavior to be the exact same species.

Are you able to get some pictures to show?

I can attempt it but my boyfriend's camera doesn't like to take action shots and ends up with tons of glare. I might have to borrow my mom's camera again.

His camera is so sensitive to motion and those loaches wouldn't sit still if I rested the camera on the edge of the stand. Just try to get a loach to sit still in the first place. So here's my blurry photos. They also kept coming out yellow with no flash despite the fact my tank is very not yellow and I went through all the camera settings.
Here are the 2 different loaches sitting in the same corner of the tank:

The one in front is one of the 3 new ones and the one in back is the first loach. The front loach has small reddish eyes that are somewhat sunken into it's head while the back loach has large round dark eyes that stick out. Also in the front loach that thin bit of skin or muscle that goes from the tail over the back a short distance doesn't exist on the other loach.

Here's one of the 3 loaches taken with flash. It shows the color better and isn't as blurry despite the glare and water spots.

This is the only picture I could get of the 1st loach. It didn't want to come near the front of the tank.

Those are the pictures I thought most useful. The rest of the pictures are here: http://photobucket.com/albums/v244/aqh88/fish/loaches/?sc=5[/font][/font][/font]

I'm not a loach expert but they look like the same species to me. I have several and they look like yours. They can change with age, my very large male does not look like what he used to when I first got him at 4". You might keep in mind that the females have different dorsal fin shape and could have different patterning. Perhaps yours are just different ages/sex.

Here is a pic of the large dojo, I couldn't find any pictures from when it was younger, but it wasn't as spotted.
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Last edited by ~jamie~ at 10-Nov-2005 06:39

hi there,
yep they are species Misgurnus Anquilladactus (sp?)
I used to have 1 identical to your first one,
but he committed suicide by burning himself on
the heater repeatedly stupid bugger :-(
Dojos are awesome.


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