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Good Morning!
Very simple question – very simple answer?
I have 4 paros, of which most likely only one is a male, in a 25 liter tank. Now I would like to take 2 of the fish out and leave the male and his supposedly preferred female in the tank.
It is a paro tank :S – many roots, many hiding places ……. leaves, caves etc. It seems obvious to me that I have to strip the tank of it’s furnishings before having even a possibility to catch the fish. No really attractive thought for me at all ……… aside from the difficulty to separate special individuals in a cloudy tank ………
Do you have any tricks?
(I remember that I was very afraid of having to catch my first 25 or so young Badis of about 2 cm length out of the totally overgrown parent tank. It was nor problem at all – they curiously swam directly into the net…. Chasing them would never have done … I tell that only because I learned that things aren’t often as difficult as you first thought. Maybe it’s the same with my actual question).
You are completely right – simpel question – not simple answer and not easy to do.
Given the difficulty we have had to actually determine what is what in your four fish, you are right, – in a cloudy tank with four scared fish it will be next to impossible to be sure that you take the right fish.
I remember in my beginning time with paroes catching them was a nightmare, – and they hide like I had never seen any fish do. You could have a 12 liter tank and think you had stripped it of everything, – leaving just a little bit of brown dust settled on the ground, maybe a few bits of leaves, – and there should be 6 fish in the tank and I could see none :blink:
They could disappear under the tiniest bit of leave or dirt and look totally invisible.
But then when you stirred them they would dart like a racket around making it so difficult. Well .. sorry 😛 ..
But – why is it then not at all that difficult for me anymore, – I must have learned some tricks, – and I will see if I can give some on to you. You sound like you have quite a lot of experience with fish and that should be helpful ..Sometimes – quite often – I simply strip the tank, – but then my tanks now are without too much. So I can lift up the javamoss, take away the wooden piece and then thats more or less it. But often I still have leaves in there.
But the things that can be taken away easy, I will take away. Then leave the tank to settle.But I do first try to see if I can catch the fish without doing any changes, and it really seem not so difficult :whistle:
But I do know its a matter of having done it many times. But if you have a good area up to the front glas where it is possible to get a net down thats helpful. The best way is to get the fish up towards the front glass and get the net over it there. Often the fish, when not disturbed, swim around the front glas anyway, and if you get the net down behind them, they will seek up to the frontglas, probably hiding in the corner or under some leave (so none of these at the front glass)
Then get the net over them, – so they are caught between the net and the front glass. To get them to seek inwards into the net I have learned that to annoy them with a small torch-light is helpful, they dont like the light right in their eyes.If you take something out, like a bigger root or something, be very careful, because they can hide in these, or actually cling so tight to them that you dont see them, – they will travel right up with the root and end on the floor.
So in your case I would :
Take away the things you can take away without making the tank a total mess, or take away as much as you can and leave it to settle again.
Clear an area up to the front glass so it is easy to get a net down there without getting it entangled in something.Wait untill the fish you want to catch is happily swimming in the area, slowly get the net down behind it. It may of course dart like an arrow to the back of the tank, – and then you missed the opportunity, but if you don’t stir up everything and make the fish totally scared, it will come again. Or you can try when you feed.
Use a medium size net, not the small ones, – the small one is fine, but its easier to target it with a bigger net.
If you have to, in the end, clear most of the tank, – well, then so be it, but leave it to settle, maybe a day, – then you have a chance of seing which fish it is you have to catch. I must say, – for me, – sometimes it just takes a long time, more days, before I am sure I get the right fish, and I am able to catch it. In your case, I quess you could decide that it doesn’t matter if it takes a bit of time, better to do it without too much disturbance.
I have heard that some people think catching them in the net can cause damage to the skin, – but I have no idea how you would catch them without a net :S … even I would like to.That’s one of the reasons why the best Paro-breeders have nearly empty tanks. If you want to have these fish decorate a nicely planted tank filled with wooden items and so on, you can nearly forget to catch them. At least with a net. A net is not the best means for catching Paros, not in nature and not in the aquarium (see below).
This is why I say: Paros are no fish for the normal decorative aquarium if you intend to catch them. You could build a fine jungle for them but then you must be sure what you put in. You won’t get it out again without disturbing and destroying everything. Often however some months later you could get mucz more fish out than you put in before. But together with the whole content.
When I visit one of our colleagues to get a fish from them (or vice versa someone comes to me for that purpose), we, keeping medium decorative tanks, have to take everything (remember Helene’s words!) out before we could begin catching, often even the gravel, if there is some at all. This is quite normal. The only difference is that I have not so many decorative requisits in the tank than those people who take the decorativity to be of first importance.
In nature, mostly nets are completely useless, too. Paros don’t swim freely in the water like barbs or rasboras. They hide in dense vegetation. The only method is to take big (!) firm plastic or metal sieves and sort the content out.
In a decorated tank you could be successful with a catching pipe made from glass (“glass fishing bell”). In former time this requisit was popular among all breeders and sellers of fish. It was offered in the pet shops everywhere. But today it has disappeared. The plastic nets have won. There is only one much too big type of “fishing bell” left made from cheap plastic for catching big cichlids, and even this is offered in one big shop in Germany only. But it is useless for Paros in small decorated tanks. Forget ist.
However, a German member of our network (Stephan Menzel) has found a small glass manufactory that is ready to produce it again in small sizes: looking like a pipe with an opening of about four centimeters only. (By the way: There is a short article by him on this issue in the “Betta News” edition that could be downloaded now here from our homepage, see pages 28/29).
This instrument looks much less “dangerous” to fish than nets. Indeed it is more difficult to be recognized at all. Of course, you have to prepare to use it. One certainly must learn to handle it, but then you could often be successful even in decorated tanks.
Thank you very much, Helene.
Your tipps confirm what I had in mind myself. There is a small free room just behind the front pane, big enough to go down with a medium sized net, and I thought that maybe it might be possible to slowly try to catch them there. I will give it a go at first, and if I don’t succeed, I can still strip the tank as far as necessary.
In the Betta News-download here on the Paro-website, I read about a glass fishing bell which is very highly recommended.
I have read about this before, many people are very satisfied with it. I formerly already found a source of supply for such a fishing bell – not made of glass but of plastic. I often thought of buying it, and then again didn’t.But first I will try it with a net – I have never experienced any uneasiness in the fish after catching them with a net up to now. And I made the experience that it is much easier to catch even small fish with a big, wide net than with a small one. But it is – as you said – a question of available room in the tank…..
[quote=”Peter Finke” post=1811]That’s one of the reasons why the best Paro-breeders have nearly empty tanks. If you want to have these fish decorate a nicely planted tank filled with wooden items and so on, you can nearly forget to catch them. [/quote]
Hello, Peter,
I know this, and I have no “decorated” tank. I set it up as it is recommended for paros ……… nearly no ground cover, just leaves, nothing planted, roots losely lying on the ground or clamped to the panes with adhesive vacuum hooks. Free swimming plants. But nevertheless it would be a massive intervention to take it all out – and I would rather save the fish from doing so.
I did it!
I did it like before with other fish ……….. first of all patience, second a net deposited quietly in a free space of the tank, wide open and easy to lift.
The first small one I caught by putting some blood worms into a medium net. It was very easy……
The bigger one was not so easy, but that was my own fault. I let im visit the net to get him acquainted to it – but obviously once to often. He lost interest and didn’t visit it again …….. for hours.
So I took the net out, put a real big and wide one in, with the opening facing upward. I had to wait three minutes, than the big one and the other small one swam over the gap and into it ……. I only had to lift the net and put the small one back into the tank.I do not know which of the small ones is with the bigger (male?) one now – is it the one which already showed kind of courtship colouration? I am able to distinguish them by the form of their pelvic filaments, but not in a small vessel, looking from above……. The other small one I put back into it’s original tank is hiding at the moment …. :blush:
But I think it is a trial, anyway …….. I only presume that all other three are females ……… I am still not sure with the second largest. But now I hope we will see ……….
Well good job 🙂
I think it is not so difficult when one has some experience, – and your method sounds right, – with a little patience, with calm movements, good nets its possible.
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